


August Seventeenth

by sidewalkzoot



Category: Animaniacs
Genre: Aight As of Chapter Five It's About to Start Getting More Problematic. So Jot That Down, F/M, I Think that Sums it Up Best, The Fans of this Story Have Been Describing it as “Spicy”, This is Marked Explicit for a Reason!!
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-02-11
Updated: 2021-03-17
Packaged: 2021-03-17 21:14:12
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Underage
Chapters: 10
Words: 47,937
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/29357043
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/sidewalkzoot/pseuds/sidewalkzoot
Summary: Yakko loves to play with fire, but can he handle the heat?Nothing even really happened, and besides, it was an accident.
Relationships: Hello Nurse/Yakko Warner
Comments: 72
Kudos: 61





	1. August Seventeenth

The tall metal fan plugged into the wall did nothing to alleviate the heavy, uncomfortable August heat. Occasionally, a rare breeze drifted through the open windows, bringing with it the loud sounds of traffic. It was the tail end of rush hour, when the big shots had already left the office and made their way into a second glass of whiskey, and the sun was promising to finally think about setting.  
What Heloise wanted more than anything at the moment was to run outside, peel off her uniform, and make her way into one of those swanky, air conditioned lounges, sipping on a sweating glass of white wine that she preferably did not pay for. Instead, she was stuck at work late this evening, and resenting her supervisor more for it with each passing minute. Granted, he was probably having an even more frustrating time than she was, stuck with the two youngest of their “problem patients” rather than just the eldest one, and she could not even imagine having to deal with a level of self-control lower than this on a day like today.  
She glanced at the clock. She’d been at work for ten hours. Her feet hurt.  
“Okay”, she said smoothly. “What are some words to describe how this makes you feel?” With a heavy chunk from the projector, she changed the slide to a grayscale image of the studio logo.  
“Bored? Let’s talk about you and me.”  
She looked at her smirking patient, stationed across the room at a table with a pencil and what used to be writing paper, now crafted into two paper airplanes and a fortune-teller. Ten hours and for what? What had she accomplished today? She forced herself to take a deep breath. They’d been in this session for forty minutes. Only twenty left to go. Her long work day was not his fault. Neither was the heat. Her hair stuck to her neck and she pulled it away, closing her eyes and thinking about that flute of white wine. When she opened them, Yakko was watching her intently.  
“Well, what about this one,” she pressed on. “How do you feel?” It was a scanned Variety article singing the praises of Thaddeus Plotz.  
“With my hands,” Yakko said, squinting at them in mock concentration. “They say they want to feel yours.”  
Chunk. She changed the slide. Images from the recent earthquake.  
“You don’t see a shake like that every day.” He batted his eyelashes at her flirtatiously.  
Chunk. A photograph of the water tower, but he didn’t even respond. She glanced over and saw that he was busy writing something on the fortune-teller. Anger washed over her suddenly, buzzing dangerously in the sticky air, and she marched over to the table, centered in the projector’s square of dingy light.  
“Pay. Attention.” she growled. He looked up and squinted at her, framing her with his fingers like he was about to take a photo.  
“Ooh, now I’m feeling something.” He held up the fortune-teller. “Wanna see into our future?”  
She batted it from his hand. “Yakko.”  
“I love it when you say my name”.  
“Why can’t you please just get through this?” The desperation in her voice undermined her intended authoritative tone, but he seemed not to have noticed.  
“Because I don’t want to. I know, let’s play a game instead!”  
“There are only two of us.”  
“Well, I’m sure we can think of something.”  
She walked back over to her desk and took a long sip of coffee. When she pulled it away, a red lipstick imprint clung to the thick recycled paper. Yakko never wanted to be a coffee cup so badly.  
“You think you’re really cute, don’t you,” she said suddenly, her voice missing its usual honey.  
“No, as a matter of fact I don’t. I happen to know I’m cute!”, Yakko announced, plastering on his best shit-eating grin.  
With a chunk, the last slide vanished and only a dull white square blearily shone on the wall, dust trailing lazily up through the air in its beam. Heloise shoved the projector away with one scarlet-painted hand and abruptly stalked over to the open window. She was not smiling.  
“You think I haven’t heard it all before?” she seethed, staring down at the simmering asphalt below. In the setting sun, her hair enshrined her in a white-gold halo, its effect reminiscent of so many Medieval paintings whose artists Yakko could list effortlessly at any time but this exact moment.  
“I get it every day. The comments, the propositions. On my way to work I hear it from the bus driver, and in the evenings I hear it again. The directors on set who can get away with saying anything. The rich, powerful executives being driven around in their golf carts, treating me like a stop on their sightseeing tour. Even the doctor has said something once or twice, and he thinks I don’t notice. Well, I’m sorry to tell you this, but I’m not stupid.”  
A dreadful feeling was growing in Yakko’s chest. He stared at the table, wishing he could just crawl under it and hide from his own shame.  
“You think I don’t notice the way men stare at me?” she continued absently from across the room. “The way their eyes linger on my body?”  
Yakko forced himself to look up at her. In the darkened room, the orange band of light from the window illuminated her like a spotlight. She was leaning on her elbows, turned away, and his eyes landed immediately upon her long, golden legs stretched out in front of him, softly tilting upwards and disappearing under her starched white uniform. The material was not flexible, and the hem fell at a professional length, but somehow the voluptuous arch of her thighs was fully pronounced beneath it. Higher, the fabric stretched gloriously tight over the round curve of her ass.  
Yakko tore his gaze away, sweating, feeling more guilty than ever. He tried to bring himself back to her monologue, but the image had burned itself into his mind, more vibrant with each blink. The room seemed to be about a thousand degrees and sickeningly humid. Those last two words echoed unhelpfully in his head. My body. My body. My body.  
“But you’re not a man, are you?” she continued slowly, turning around to face him.  
Don’t you need a special license to reassign someone’s gender?  
“You’re just a boy.”  
Oh. She seemed to be waiting for a response, but for once, he couldn’t seem to think of a single thing to say. He felt his face burning as she raised her eyebrows disdainfully.  
“Speechless? I thought so.” She laughed viciously. “You sure talk a lot about things you don’t understand. If you got your way,” She paused, choosing her words. “If you had me,” and now she was walking towards him, her hips swinging slowly with each step, “Would you even know what to do?”  
He could almost physically feel all the blood in his body rushing downwards, and he crossed his legs quickly in what he hoped was a casual manner, but in doing so the friction only made matters worse.  
“Didn’t think so.” The room spun dizzyingly as Heloise sat on the table, her legs dangling over the front. She kicked off one white shoe at a time, not bothering to see where they landed. She let out a sigh of relief, her back arching suggestively in the projector’s glow, the only light left in the stifling, shadowy room. “God, I couldn’t wait another minute to get those off.”  
Yakko couldn’t breathe. His heart in his throat, he looked up wide-eyed, only to find her face inches from his. She was thrillingly close. She smelled like some kind of tropical shampoo, and it made his head swim. Her heavy lidded eyes were irresistibly blue, and commanded him to maintain contact like an unbreakable spell.  
“Look at you”, she purred in a low voice. “So worked up,” she leaned forward and whispered throatily in his ear, “and I haven’t even touched you.”  
He couldn't help it. He came, her breath still warm on his face, her thick hair brushing his neck ever so slightly, and the tropical fragrance enveloping him. Eyelids fluttering, he barely heard his own involuntary moan, giving in to the hot, hypnotic ripple of his own longing.

A ringing sound somewhere. Blearily, Yakko opened his eyes and saw Heloise standing by the window once again, as if the last few minutes had been a dream. The lights were on, oppressively bright.  
“That’s all the time we have for today. You are free to leave,” she said evenly, without looking at him. No response.  
“Mr. Warner, I must ask you to leave. I have other matters to attend to.” She didn’t turn around until she heard the door close. 

She staggered to her desk in her stockinged feet. The report sat there dauntingly, waiting for her to fill out, one last task between her and that wine.  
Today’s Date: August 17th. Easy enough. Her hand quivered as she wrote.  
Patient Name:  
She paused, then filled it in, barricading her racing thoughts from breaching her own consciousness. She stared at that date and name for a moment and then moved on to the next segment.  
Today’s Exercise: Visual Cognition.  
Methodology:  
Notes:  
The report sat there, staring at her reproachfully. She blinked repeatedly and then slammed the pen down. I didn’t do anything!  
She got up defensively and grabbed her purse. It wasn’t intentional. She found one shoe and slipped it on. I didn’t know. She hunted down the second shoe, desperate to leave. It’s not my fault! 

Heloise grabbed the keys and bolted to the door to lock up. Crunch. Beneath her foot was the fortune teller. Her heart stopped. Nervously, she bent down to pick it up. 

Number 1- “Kiss Me”  
Number 2- “Kiss Me”  
Number 3- “Kiss Me”  
Number 4- “Kiss Me”


	2. August Twenty-First

“And so it is with tremendous gratitude that I once again thank each and every one of you for attending our little shindig tonight. We are only able to keep functioning with the help of every single person in this room, and no one’s part is too small! A good workplace must run like a well-oiled machine….”  
The condescending speech droned on tediously, despite the misleading implications that it may soon be coming to an end. From her vantage point high in the opera boxes, Heloise glanced down at the mezzanine for the millionth time that night. Yakko and his little sister were whispering to each other and shaking with laughter. At least, it looked like they were whispering, but the affronted looks from nearby seats seemed to indicate otherwise.  
Heloise exhaled and made an effort to relax her shoulders, returning her gaze once again to the stage. Not once in the past four days had the events of Thursday evening left her mind, but tonight had been a ray of hope that perhaps life would return to normal. Maybe she had been overreacting, anyway. After all, nothing had really happened.  
“On behalf of our entire team, I commend you all. Good night.”  
The audience jolted to their feet as a collective mass and began applauding wildly, thankful for an end to the agony. But alas, another figure was making her way onto the stage.  
“Wow, what inspiring words! You know, this little event is always my favorite time of the year. It may be mandatory, but it’s always fun! I’d like to add a few comments myself before we let you all go for the night. Don’t worry ladies and gentlemen, they’ll be quick!”  
Audible groaning could be heard as the attendees settled back down.  
Heloise eyed the mezzanine again. Wakko was crawling under the rows of seats, apparently looking for gum. The guests nearby seemed less disgusted than one would expect and instead grateful for the entertainment. An elderly woman in a sequined black hat fished a pack of Mentos out of her handbag and brandished it at Wakko. Yakko snatched it away haughtily and made a big show of reading the ingredients, looking suspiciously at the lady. The surrounding few rows began laughing loud enough for the speaker to pause and stare at the crowd sternly until silence fell once more. Heloise realized that she was laughing, too. She stopped.  
“Never be afraid to raise any concerns to your friendly management team. We really are just like you! We’d rather talk to you about your working conditions than have you go off and discuss it amongst each other.” A meaningful pause. “There are no secrets among friends!”  
Heloise squinted at the itinerary pamphlet in the darkness of the theater. These last few “quick words” were not on it, nor was the speaker’s name. Dr. Scratchnsniff was snoring loudly next to her. She fiddled with her earrings and looked back down once more. Yakko was looking directly up at her. He held her gaze for a moment, then blew her a kiss. She turned her head firmly and fixed her eyes on the stage, heart beating a mile a minute. What the fuck? She glanced back before she could stop herself, only to find that he was still watching her. He raised his eyebrows at her. Heloise held the pamphlet up in front of her face, cheeks burning. Indignation coursed through her inexplicably. Maybe you’re angry because you can’t control the narrative, said a voice deep inside of her. You’re not the only one who remembers it, stupid. She made a mental note to throw her psychology degree in the shredder.  
“Well, I won’t take any more of your time,” the speaker began, and the audience jumped up, applauding enthusiastically, drowning out the rest of her sentence. As if part of a hive mind, everyone reached for their coats and bags, deciding that it was over. Heloise shook the doctor. Come on, wake up wake up wake up, let’s get out of here. He opened his eyes and confusedly began clapping.  
“I’m going to start heading out, doctor”, she said, and made her way out of the box. She all but broke into a run as soon as she passed through the door.

“Oh, nurse!” Yakko’s voice called through the crowd.  
You’ve got to be fucking shitting me. Heloise kept her head down and elbowed faster through the thick jungle of expensively dressed colleagues.  
“Excuse me, sorry, I am in dire need of a medical professional.”  
“Oh, my goodness!”  
The door was in sight. She reached out to push it open.  
A tap on her shoulder. “Uh, pardon me, ma’am, are you Miss Nerz?”  
She refused to make eye contact. “Mr. Warner, if you have a concern, I assure you that Dr. Scratchnsniff will be more than capable of addressing it during your regularly scheduled sessions.”  
“Okay, I’ll go tell him all about it. Thanks for the advice,” he said, and began to stroll leisurely back into the crowd, whistling loudly.  
“Wait!” she cried. Instant regret flooded her as several heads turned inquisitively. She cleared her throat and awkwardly pretended to read the itinerary.  
“Why nurse, I do believe you’re blushing.”  
“I don’t know what you’re talking about”, she hissed furiously. “And besides, it’s you who should be embarrassed.”  
“Why?”  
“Because,” she yanked him close to whisper as quietly and cruelly as she could, “Most girls prefer their men to last longer than-”

“Ah, Miss Nerz, zair you are!” Dr. Scratchnsniff approached with the two children in tow, then gave her a strange look. “Vaht are you two talking about?”  
Heloise let go of Yakko like a hot stove.  
“She was just scolding me for my bad behavior, Doc.” He turned away from them and bowed to her melodramatically. “I promise I’ll be better next time.” He gave her a wink.  
“Oh, isn’t zaht excellent! I am glad to see zaht ze private session has made an impact. Maybe we consider zis again, ya?”  
“Ya!” Yakko smiled innocently. Dr. Scratchnsniff handed Heloise the large briefcase he had been holding and put on his suit jacket.  
“Okay, vell, scurry along home now, ya? Ve vill see you zis Thursday, goodbye for now.” Without waiting for a response he headed for the door, Heloise following thankfully.

“What was that all about?” asked Wakko.  
“Beats me. Real nut job, that one,” Yakko replied.


	3. August Twenty-Second (Midnight)

“Vodka sour, courtesy of your friend over there,” said the bartender, gesturing towards a leather-clad woman that Heloise had never seen in her life. The stranger caught her eye and held up her own drink in a mock toast.  
Heloise accepted the gift, grateful for anything to take her mind off the torment of that evening. As she began to drink it, her mysterious benefactor slid into the seat next to her.  
“Do I know you?”  
“You’re about to. What’s your name?”  
“Heloise.”  
“Hi.”  
Heloise sipped her drink.  
“Sorry. But honestly, what kinda name is that?”, the stranger asked, either remarkably oblivious to the rudeness of the question or enviably unattached to social norms. “What are you, French or something?”   
“Québécoise.”  
“Huh?”  
“French Canadian.”  
“Ah, I see, I see…..” She twirled her straw thoughtfully, and the ice cubes clinked harmoniously in their red vodka bath. “Assigned Canadian at birth.” She looked Heloise directly in the eyes. “ACAB.”  
They looked at each other very solemnly for a moment, and then broke down laughing. It felt as though a weight had been lifted from Heloise’s chest, in the form of a distraction.  
“You’re weird!” she gasped, still laughing. “Who are you?”  
“Deja.”  
“Like the vu?”  
“What’s that, some kinda French people joke? Damn, oui oui baguette girl. And yes, I like the view very much, thanks for asking.”  
“I can’t tell whether you’re insulting me or hitting on me.”  
“Both, bitch. Wanna dance?”  
“I haven’t finished my drink.”  
Deja gave her a look, and then downed her own cocktail in one go. She jumped up on the footrail, leaning over the sticky bar, and shouted, “Hey! Hey, can I get two shots of tequila here?”   
Heloise smacked her playfully on the arm. “Tequila shots?”  
“Oh, and two limes!” She leaned down to Heloise. “I guess you’re tryna be a real lady about it, huh. Don’t worry, mademoiselle. Deja always provides.” She took the shots from the bartender. “The tab’s under Thomas. Blue AmEx.”  
Deja was almost intimidatingly pretty. Her bouncy black hair framed high cheekbones, full lips, and catlike brown eyes, glazed in gold eyeshadow. To match, she was wearing thick gold earrings and an identical gold necklace, which gave her an air of royalty. Her appearance combined with her unflinching confidence breathed authority and commanded respect.  
Why can’t I be like that? Heloise was thinking, and the weight in her chest returned. I just let anyone say anything they want to me. I’m so sick of it. No one would treat Deja Thomas that way.   
“Hey, what’s wrong?” Deja looked genuinely concerned, still holding up the two shot glasses.  
“I…..” Why not tell the truth. “I wish I could be more like you.”  
“Like me? Huh?” Deja laughed. “I met you five minutes ago and you’re over here tryna be more like me? Have you seen yourself? You’re fine as hell!”  
“What I mean is, it seems like people listen to you.”  
“Oh, true. Well,” she said, putting the glasses down on the table and reaching for the salt shaker, “All you gotta do is know what you want and ask for it. And tell people to fuck off if they don’t like that. You wanna be the boss, then act like it.”   
“It’s not that easy, Deja. You know I can’t exactly say things like that in my daily life. I can’t just tell my supervisor or my landlord to fuck off.”  
“Then say ‘suck my dick’ instead. Are you ready for this?” She licked the back of her hand and sprinkled salt generously on the wet patch. She smiled and gestured for Heloise’s hand. Then, without breaking eye contact, she licked it too, slower this time, and skillfully flicked the point of her tongue up as she drew it away from Heloise’s skin, giving her a purposeful look. Heloise gasped involuntarily at the intimate contact.   
Deja finished applying the salt. “There.” She carefully allocated each of them one shot and one lime. “Clink clink, hoe.” Heloise licked up the salt and threw back the shot, silently mourning the unfortunate loss of the taste of Deja’s tongue, erased immediately by the acrid tequila. She grimaced as she sucked on the lime.   
“Oof! That one wasn’t easy. You feel any better?” Deja asked, muffled by the citrus in her mouth.  
“I guess, a little. Not really.”  
“Two more tequilas, mister!”  
“Deja!”  
“Okay, fine. You get to pick this time.”  
“I- do they have to be shots?”  
“Yes. Sorry, these are the rules.”  
Heloise sighed. What did she want? Well, she kind of wanted Deja to lick her again, but she already vetoed the tequila. Can’t go back now. “Okay. Rum. And let me pay this time.”  
“Nope. Deja always provides. Captain Morgan instead, under Thomas, please!”  
Heloise stepped up onto the footrail. “No,” she announced, slamming her palm down into a puddle of unknown liquid. “Take my card instead.” She handed it to the bartender.  
“Okay, I see how it is. Heloise always provides. Sign me the fuck up.”  
The man returned with two shots. He returned the card to Heloise and said, “Wish I could be part of whatever party you two are having tonight.”  
Deja put herself in his face. “Please feel free to choke on my entire cock.”  
“Please feel free to get the fuck out of my bar, bitch.”  
Deja gulped down her rum and walked backwards out of the bar, both middle fingers raised. Heloise glanced at the bartender, who was looking at her expectantly. She drank her shot, too, and ran after Deja.

It took only a minute to spot her dancing down the sidewalk, twirling between the gaggles of drunk partygoers.   
“That was pretty intense.”  
“Nah, it wasn’t. Fuck that guy.”  
Okay, yeah, but that was still pretty intense, though, Heloise thought to herself. Maybe she didn’t want to be like Deja after all. She could never do something like that. But what was the other option, just swallowing that comment? She felt it was only justice that the man got put in his place, even though they ended up being the ones who suffered the consequences.  
“Why’d you follow me?”  
“Oh, I, uh, thought you wanted to dance.”  
“I do. Let’s check out this place.” They were in front of a black-bricked club called L’Éveil, as per the huge neon lights splashed over the entrance. Muffled music and joyful shouts came from within.   
“What does that mean? Lay-veel.”  
Heloise started to answer, but Deja was already at the door, showing her ID to the bouncer before disappearing into the hot pink light within. Heloise followed.  
“Is that your real name, Hello Kitty?” the bouncer laughed.   
“Suck my dick,” said Heloise. The words had barely left her mouth before she stammered, “Oh my gosh, I’m so sorry. I really don’t know what came over me. I swear I’m never like this. It’s my friend, she-”   
“Just get inside, psycho.”

Deja was nowhere to be seen. The flashing lights made it hard to even get a layout of the room. As she stumbled through the throng, Heloise was very aware of how out of place she looked in her formal evening gown from that night’s ceremony. She also felt a little bit drunk already, and remembered that she had not stayed for food after the event, nor had she eaten dinner before it. But when she spotted the bar, she plotted a course towards it, on the assumption that obtaining more alcohol would be Deja’s first order of business. No glimpse of big curly hair surfaced anywhere.   
“Sir, I’d like two tequila shots, please,” she declared, hoping at least to please Deja whenever she did reappear. She scanned the crowd quickly as the last song ended and the light show temporarily let up. Still no sign.  
“You don’t look like the kind of girl I’d expect to see here,” said a bald man, looming from the depths of the tangled masses. “You look like you should be in bed already, like a good girl.”  
“Well, that’s only because you don’t know anything about me, do you. You don’t even know my name,” Heloise snarled.  
“Which is?”  
“…..Deja.” She regretted lying. It felt like her sins were piling up. Rather than continue the conversation, she pointedly moved away from him. Truth be told, she didn’t usually like clubbing all that much, but how dare he correctly assume that.  
Heloise turned back around to retrieve her debit card from her purse, but froze as the first few bars of the all too familiar next song began. It was a sexy, oscillating synth beat that stubbornly refused to fade from popularity, evidenced by the uproar of cheers from the dancefloor as the group recognized it in unison.

I made it through the wilderness.  
Somehow, I made it through.

“I love this song!” screamed a voice beside her over the music. It was Deja, already moving her hips to the rhythm. “Come on, let’s go dance!”  
“You gonna pay for these or what?” said the bartender. Numbly, Heloise exchanged the card for the shots, and Deja squealed in delight. She licked her hand, salt at the ready.  
“Want me to do you?” she beamed. Heloise held out her hand, but found herself distracted from Deja’s attempts to be seductive by Madonna’s mewling voice.

But you made me feel  
Yeah you made me feel, shiny and new……

Deja downed the shot and shrieked in excitement. Heloise forced the tequila down, the taste less unpleasant this time and more like a welcoming slap in the face. Fuck it, let’s go dance. She let Deja drag her by the arm out to the middle of the pulsating dancefloor. 

Like a virgin  
Touched for the very first time  
Like a virgin  
When your heart beats next to mine

Deja danced close to Heloise, their bodies only separated by a few inches. She rolled her hips and shoulders as she sang, never once breaking eye contact.   
“Gonna give you all my love, boy,” Deja crooned, breaching the space between them and wrapping her arms around Heloise, “My fear is fading fast.”  
Heloise echoed her movements, pushing her body back on Deja’s. The world around them seemed to disappear. This dance was all that was important. She hadn’t noticed that they were leaving the center of the floor, but suddenly her back was against a wall. Her head smacked against it in a way that would’ve hurt if she weren’t drunk. Instead, it felt exciting.

You’re so fine, and you’re mine

Deja was sucking on her neck now. Heloise closed her eyes and enjoyed the sensation. 

Make me strong  
Yeah you make me bold

Deja brought one finger up to Heloise’s chin and gently guided her head down to look her in the eyes. “Like a virgin,” Deja sang, with an obscene expression. “Ooh, ooh, like a virgin, it feels so good inside.”   
Heloise felt fiercely aroused. She kissed Deja hard, who responded by pinning her to the wall. So this is what she needed. One of Deja’s hands had made its way up her skirt and was caressing her inner thigh, closer and closer…. 

Can’t you hear my heart beat for the very first time?

“Alright, break it up, you two.” A flashlight. Both women jumped.  
“This is a public place, you freaks,” said the man holding the light. “What are you, some kind of perverts?”  
“Suck my dick!” shouted Deja.   
It occurred to Heloise that Deja was not confident, she was actually stupid. She wasn’t assertive, she was reckless. She was simply unacceptable. And Heloise would not be in this horrible position if it weren’t for her thoughtlessness.  
“I’m sorry, sir,” she said, and pushed her way out of the club before anyone could see the tears forming in her eyes.

She didn’t slow down until she made it to the bus stop.  
LADOT Night Bus Timetable: bus every 15 minutes before 11:00 and every 30 after. She had no idea what time it was. There were still a lot of people in the street. All she could do was sit and wait at this point, and even if it took the full half hour, that wouldn’t be so bad.  
Well, it wouldn’t have been so bad, except that she had no distraction from her thoughts.   
You overreacted and you know it, she told herself. They probably deal with that kind of thing every day. And why are you so mad at Deja? Both of you made that choice.   
She felt calmer, sitting there being honest with herself, even if the truth was uncomfortable. Okay, let’s get into it, and don’t lie. Why did that song freak you out so much? She closed her eyes and played it in her head.

Like a virgin  
Touched for the very first time

She opened her eyes. She wasn’t feeling freaked out, she was feeling the same arousal as before. Well, that’s obviously because of Deja. It’s because of Deja.  
“What’s because of me? Wow, you say my name so nicely.” Deja skipped up to the bus stop. “I couldn’t find you! Aren’t we gonna hit the next club?”   
“No thanks, Deja. I have work tomorrow.” Fuck, she only just now remembered that.   
“Aw, no! Well, I’ve got a gift for you.” Deja pulled a pen out of her bag and uncrumpled a receipt from the first bar. She scrawled her phone number on it and handed it to Heloise.  
Heloise didn’t take it.   
“I’m sorry Deja, I don’t think so.”  
“What? But we had so much fun….” Her voice trailed off despondently.  
“I just have a lot to think about. And I really need to be focusing on my work right now.”  
“I bet you’re married. You’re in a relationship, aren’t you?”  
“No no no, I’m- I’m not married.”  
“Okay, so it’s complicated.”  
“It is not complicated! It’s totally uncomplicated. There is nothing complicated about it! That makes it sound like a whole thing and it’s not.” Deja’s expression was unreadable, and it only furthered her hysteria. “I didn’t do anything, alright? I didn’t even touch him!”  
The bus had pulled up behind her. Deja was looking at her like she had three heads.  
“Look, it was nice to meet you, okay?” Heloise turned and boarded the bus. Silhouetted in the round yellow circle of the streetlamp, Deja stood motionless on the sidewalk, watching Heloise through the window until the bus turned the corner.

The lights on the bus went round and round. Heloise had forgotten she was drunk. 

Heloise made it to her stop twenty five minutes later. As she walked in the door of her apartment, the clock struck midnight.  
She threw her purse down in a chair and poured herself a glass of water. She made herself drink all of it and then refilled it, trying to remember how many shots she’d had that night. Three? Four? That’s not too many, but then again she hadn’t eaten. That had to be the reason everything felt so surreal.   
She needed to get some sleep so she could wake up on time tomorrow, but her mind was racing, as it had been unrelentingly the past several nights. Her eyes landed on her Walkman, lying on the couch. She put on the headphones and hesitated in front of her cassette rack. There it was in baby blue and gold: The Immaculate Collection. She reached for the tape. If she didn’t, she would feel disingenuous, somehow. She had unfinished business with that song.

I made it through the wilderness  
Somehow I made it through

She closed her eyes and stretched her body out on the couch. The arousal was back.

Didn’t know how lost I was until I found you

She thought about Deja’s fingers on her inner thigh, lightly brushing her skin, teasing her in a crowded public place like that. It was so….. thrilling. She paused the music and opened her eyes for a moment, remembering her mixed emotions. Thrilling? It was so wrong. But she took a deep breath and closed her eyes again, reminding herself to be completely honest. 

I was beat, incomplete  
I’d been had, I was sad and blue  
But you made me feel  
Yeah you made me feel  
Shiny and new

Gently, she brought her own fingers up and under her skirt, mimicking the gentle circles that Deja had traced. Higher and higher. Delicate and slow. Her breath hitched.

Like a virgin, touched for the very first time

She paused the music again to run upstairs and get her vibrator out of the bedside table. She collapsed on the bed and stared at the ceiling, then switched the vibrator to its lowest setting and pressed play on the Walkman.

Gonna give you all my love boy  
My fear is fading fast

She slowly rubbed the vibrator back and forth across her clit, bucking her hips into it. She imagined herself back at the club with Deja, except this time Deja was stroking her pussy, kissing her neck contentedly. Her arousal intensified past the point of return.

You’re so fine  
And you’re mine

No one else was in the club with them. In fact, the room was dark and empty. The only light came from the projector.

Heloise opened her eyes in shock, but pushed it aside quickly. She wanted to finish the fantasy more than she wanted to lie around arguing with herself. She was already enjoying it so much, and she needed to know what happens next.

Deja sat across the room at a table. Lying in front of her was the crumpled receipt with her phone number scrawled on it. She watched Heloise with hungry eyes, always lingering shamelessly on her breasts, her hips, her legs, her ass. Her desire was incredibly palpable, to the point that it was hard to ignore. Her face was flushed, and her breathing was heavy.   
“Why are you acting like this?” Heloise asked.   
“Can’t you see that I’m desperate for you?” Deja moaned. “I’ve waited for so long and I’m ready. I swear I’m ready. I think about it every day. I want you to teach me how to make you feel good. Show me how to touch you.”  
Heat stirred between Heloise’s legs.  
“We've-we’ve only known each other for a couple of hours,” she stammered.  
Deja gave her a look. “You know that’s not true.”

The sun was setting outside.

Heloise walked over to the table and sat on top of it, facing Deja.   
“First, unbutton my dress. Do as you're told.”  
Deja’s hips gyrated up into the table, looking for friction. She unbuttoned the first button, and then the second, and then the third, eyes wide. Her hands stopped when the dress was unbuttoned down to the waist, staring at Heloise’s breasts and breathing hard.  
“Now take off my bra.”  
Deja looked up at her worshipfully, but then said, “How?”

Heloise disconnected from her fantasy for a moment, unable to disregard the fact that Deja obviously would know how to unclasp a bra. But she couldn’t stop now. 

Heloise took Deja’s hands in her own. She brought them to her back and dragged them over the metal hook. After a second of fumbling, the bra fell away. Deja’s eyelids fluttered and she released a guttural whimper.  
“You can touch them.”  
Heloise’s nipples hardened under the exploratory massage of trembling fingers. In real life, she stroked her own breast with one hand, turning up the intensity of her vibrator with the other.  
“I can’t- I can’t- I’m going to-” Deja couldn’t even finish the sentence. He looked wretchedly embarrassed and so beautifully undone.  
“That’s okay,” Heloise said. She climbed off the table and into Deja’s lap, and was surprised to feel beneath the fabric what was clearly a thick, very erect cock. She positioned herself on it so that he could feel the heat contained only by her thin lace panties, and leaned forward so that her naked tits hung in his face and her hair enveloped them both. “We can try again next week.” 

Deja moaned achingly in his real voice and came. Heloise could feel the hot wetness starting to seep into the fabric of their clothes, and she came in real life too. 

Silence. The headphones had come off her head and fallen onto the floor. They lay there next to her bra. Heloise panted through the last aftershocks of her orgasm. Then she set her alarm and fell asleep in her clothes without thinking one more thought.


	4. August Twenty-Fourth

After finally feeling herself, Heloise was finally feeling herself.

The sun had risen dutifully once again on another Thursday morning, radiantly blue like the last, but this week mercifully cool and forgiving, as though August, on its deathbed, begged to be remembered fondly. 

This dawn of this day no longer brought with it the ominous dread of uncertainty, for Heloise had been enlightened in those mystical hours wherein Monday night met Tuesday morning. She flashed her badge at the gate with the unshakable confidence of a woman reborn, fresh hot coffee held under fresh crimson nail polish, her spotless white heels clicking rhythmically on the ground. One by one, she met the gaze of her usual array of spectators and each man cowered beneath it.

Yesterday evening they’d left the office early, having been informed that they were to be granted their very own work computer, and that a team would be needing the room later to install it. Before they left, Dr. Scratchnsniff had asked Heloise nervously if he might have a word with her.

“It is about Yakko.”  
She assumed it must be.  
“You see, ah… for ze session tomorrow he has requested that you might try vorking again one-on-one. I know zaht it is a lot to ask of you, but ah… but you see, I have to agree, he has responded so vell to it…..” He rubbed his scalp with a pathetic sort of trepidation. “So, ah. Yes, ah, zaht vill be your six o’clock.”  
“Very well.” She continued filing the rest of the day’s documents, thinking absently about how many she’d now be required to type. She didn’t go to school to be a secretary.  
“Ah, Miss Nerz, please, if zis is not something you are comfortable vith, I understand, he is not easy to manage, and, vell, I know how he can be vith you…” He sounded uncomfortable.  
She looked up. “I assure you sir, I know how to manage him.”  
He bounced joyously in place, looking like he wanted to hug her. “Ah, zank you so much! Oh finally, finally, ve are making progress! And zey thought I couldn’t do it! I know zey vill revard us for zis… already ve are to be getting a computer!” He turned around. “Oh, by ze vay, ve are going to need to type up all of our old files, so make a note of zaht.”  
“Perhaps we could hire a receptionist.”  
He froze mid-bounce, incredulous. “I shall….. put in a request, Miss Nerz.”

And so Heloise faced Thursday fearlessly. As far as she was concerned, she’d cured her own case. She had simply been confusing sexual fantasy with her genuine motivations. She’d found last week exhilarating, true, but there was nothing wrong with that. Anyone would find that kind of attention to be… flattering. And after all, wasn’t this kind of scenario the tried-and-true basis of innumerable pornos? That doesn’t mean that every person who enjoys those is a… a…  
Well, the point is that anyone can fantasize about anything meaningless, and that doesn’t make them a bad person, she concluded. She just had to keep that secret indulgence separate from her real life, and everything would be fine. She knew how to do her job.

A knock on the door split the silence at 5:50, causing Heloise to jump and spill her third cup of coffee perilously close to the brand new, still untouched keyboard. She blinked at the clock and then walked over to the door.

A bored-looking woman slouched in the hallway. She was wearing a tacky yellow pantsuit with enormous shoulder pads, and holding her briefcase and car keys in an almost hostile expression of her intention to go home as soon as possible.  
“Almost forgot. Got this memo for you here,” she said, lazily waving an envelope at Heloise. She dropped it before Heloise could grab it, then walked away without apologizing.  
Heloise returned to her desk and slid out the letter. It was typed on pristine printer paper, with the exception of an extravagant cursive signature at the bottom.

To the Psychiatric Office of Dr. O. Scratchnsniff,

I regret to inform you that the studio’s budget does not allow for the placement of a receptionist in your department at this time. I wish to gently remind you that the need for a psychiatric team at a movie studio is questionable at best, let alone the allotment of a more than generous salary going towards not only one but two members of staff. I am well aware of your good fortune in securing your own office computer and eagerly anticipate results from you in order to prove to me that the purchase of this piece of expensive equipment was not wasted. I suggest that you familiarize yourselves with how to use it and be grateful for the opportunity to learn this valuable skill. That’s it Marie, I think they get the message. Yes. No. No, just forge my name at the bottom, they’re waiting for me on the golf course. Cancel my 3:00. Just say something came up.

Sincerely,  
Thaddeus Plotz, CEO

“Twat,” Heloise said, wadding the letter up and slam dunking it into the trash.

“Whoa, I’m learning so much already,” a voice rang out. Yakko was leaning against the frame of the open door, looking delighted. “Hello Nurse! I’m seeing so many new sides of you. What else have you got for me?”  
She was seeing new sides of herself. “Please, Mr. Warner, take your seat.” She smoothed out her uniform and hastily mopped up the spilled coffee with a tissue from beside the chaise longue. To her surprise, he obeyed her without a second warning, watching her wipe the tissue back and forth, his eyes fixed significantly below hers.  
“What happened?”, he asked. It took her a second to realize he was referring to the letter.  
“Mr. Warner, I am not here to discuss my personal life with you.”  
“So what are you here to discuss?”  
“I’m here to discuss your- personal- your personal life with- you.” Goddamn him. She’d been so collected up until this point, but the awkward sentence structure got tangled up on her tongue.  
“Wouldn’t you say that there’s an overlap there? You discussing your personal life with me and me discussing my personal life with you?”  
“There is nothing that you and I have to discuss.”  
He gasped. “There’s a ‘you and I’?”  
“Mr. Warner. The purpose of this session is not for us to waste time.”  
He gasped again. “There’s an ‘us’?”  
Frustrated, Heloise pretended to make a note on her report, stalling. They’d only been here for about five minutes and already she was losing control of the conversation. No matter how authoritatively she presented herself, he always had something to say that caught her off guard. 

Except, a voice in her head sang mischievously, that one time that he didn’t.

Her thoughts were interrupted.  
“Why are you writing with a pen when you have a computer right there? Hey, can I turn it on?”

“Why did you request this appointment if you don’t plan to focus? Dr. Scratchnsniff has been very impressed with your good behavior and was hoping we could continue to make progress.”  
“Because I was also hoping we could continue to make progress," he smirked. 

Heloise got up from her desk and stood in front of the table, arms crossed. “Perhaps I wasn’t clear enough,” she said forcefully. “So let me spell this out for you. We. Are. Not. Going. To. Have. That. Discussion.”  
He raised his eyebrows, a slight smile on his parted lips.

Torture him, urged the wicked voice in her head. 

“Look at me,” she coaxed. “Did you hear what I said?”  
He nodded vigorously.  
“Good boy. I see that the rumors are true. You really have been on your best behavior.” She walked back to her desk, making sure to swing her hips sensually, giving him time to drink in her curves before she turned her head again.  
“You know, it’s hard when you’re always rewarding the bad behavior.”  
She gave him a look and he snapped his mouth shut obediently.  
Heloise tilted her head to the side, letting a curtain of hair drape over her shoulder. “I know it’s hard,” she sighed suggestively, “But that’s why I’m so proud of you.”  
He bit his bottom lip needily and shifted in his chair but continued to be silent.

“Now,” she stated professionally, ignoring the motor that had begun running deep within her, “Let’s begin.” She picked up her report in its folder and clicked the pen. “How has your mental state changed or stagnated since your last appointment?”  
He blushed feverishly. “Well, that’s what I was just trying to tell you, nurse,” he replied in a broken voice. “I- I find myself uhhh…. distracted.” He looked down at the desk helplessly. “I’ve been thinking about… what, uhh. What you said.” He drummed his fingers on the table.  


She looked at him coolly, pushing him wordlessly to continue, her schooled expression betraying none of her electric enjoyment of his anguish.  


“About how,” he stuttered, “I-I wouldn’t… know what to do. With… you.”  
“Mr. Warner,” She scolded with false contempt, getting up from her chair. “I will only continue our session if we are assessing topics related to your mental health.”  
“But this is related to my mental health! Please,” he begged, and she shuddered as she struggled to keep the fire in her veins concealed. “It’s all I can think about anymore.” 

Just like my fantasy, thought Heloise. Except maybe less sophisticated. Yakko looked absolutely mortified, his face in his hands, gazing up at her with vulnerable eyes.

Heloise paced contemplatively. She let out of a long exhale. “It is not uncommon for an adolescent male of your age to experience hypersexuality, or,” she paused, then said, “premature ejaculation.” He looked like he’d just been struck by lightning. “In fact,” she continued, “It’s to be expected. It is very rarely a sign of a serious mental or physical health problem.”

She stepped into his space, and he stayed fixated on her as though she radiated a magnetic field. “However,” she explained, “Throughout the rest of your adult life, you may still find yourself somewhat distracted by these impulses. Most of us manage this by providing ourselves with healthy release on a regular basis.”  
At the word "us", his eyes widened. Heloise hadn’t considered that her choice of that word would affect him, but she could see his imagination already working furiously. She wondered briefly how he pictured she would masturbate, then had to shut down that train of thought.

“Yakko.”  
His eyes met hers, glazed over with lust.  
“Do you touch yourself often?”  
He breathed out a lewd whine.  
“Answer me.”  
“I…..I…..I…..I’m never alone.” He was squirming in his chair urgently.  
“If you do want relief from these cravings, then it may be to your benefit to try this. I suggest you find a way to make the time to be alone. You’re smart. You can think of something." She paused. "You do know how, don’t you?” 

She was sure that he did, but was wholly possessed by the sinful thrill of pushing him just to the edge of his breaking point. She could tell he was trying to keep it together today in order to impress her, and she was determined to break his composure. She picked up the pen and placed it upright on the table. Then she gripped the barrel with her right hand and began fisting it with her left, caressing the very tip of the cap with gentle strokes of her thumb. She leaned her chin forward over it, mouth parted above the nib and half-closed eyes looking up to meet his own, letting her face relax into the most whorish expression she could compose, one which came to her naturally through the charged waves of her own arousal.  
“Like this.”

He squeezed his eyes shut and turned his face away, mouth hanging wide open as he panted for air. His hands were clenched tightly in his lap.  


“And while you do this, I recommend that you think about whatever it is that’s been distracting you. And even if you think that you don’t know what to do with me, I bet you know what you want to do, Yakko. I bet you know what your body wants.”  


He looked at her, frenzied.  


“This is your homework. I think we’re done for today.”

She picked up the pen and folder and nonchalantly sat back down at her desk, filling out the report. 

Date: August 24th. 

Patient: Yakko Warner. 

Exercise: Talk Therapy. 

She looked up, pretending to be surprised at his presence.  
“Oh, Mr. Warner, you can go now.”  


He struggled to his feet, hands still shielding the front of his pants, and staggered out the door.  
“Don’t forget what we talked about!” She called after him gleefully.

After an indiscernible amount of time, Heloise realized she’d been staring into space, adrenaline coursing through her body. A spark buzzed between her legs. It was definitely time to call it quits for the night. As she placed her report in its folder, she hit play on the answering machine. One new voicemail. Better not be important.  


“Ah, Miss Nerz? Yes, hello. It is me. I must tell you zaht I vill be late returning tonight. Ve are still forty minutes away and- ow- ze traffic, it is stopped. Agh! Stop zat!! Ze radio says ve may be here for,” he sounded on the brink of tears, “Anuzzer hour. Do not vait for me, I vill see you tomorrow. If you do not stop zis at vonce-” Beep.  


So, the doctor and the two little ones, gone for another, what, hour and a half? The message had come through at… 6:30. It was now only 6:45. The buzz developed into a roar.

Twenty minutes later, Heloise stepped off the bus and didn’t stop until she’d reached her bedroom. She did not bother to keep her voice down as she rode out her orgasm, inflamed by the knowledge that tonight, her catharsis was harmonized.


	5. The End of August

AUGUST 27th, SUNDAY MORNING

Five young women shared a plastic booth in a lively, colorful diner on the infamous Santa Monica Boulevard. Sunlight streamed through the windows and illuminated each cheerful face, their conversation rapidly accelerating in volume and lack of suitability for a public setting. Heloise had been walking on air for the last few days, and this catch-up Sunday brunch was the icing on the cake.  
On her left, Kim was finishing off a long story about her most recent fling. Ultimately, he’d turned out to be a douchebag, as was clear to all, except, apparently, Kim, from the onset of the monologue. Heloise wasn’t paying attention. She was sucking on the end of her spoon, lost in thought.

“I was actually just reading this, like, feminist theory book, and the author said that if a man didn’t make you cum, then he basically used you as a sex toy,” said Jackie sagely, sipping her tea.  
All the other women nodded in agreement.  
“New rule for all of us!” declared Kim. “Stop fucking men who don’t know how to make you cum!" Around the table drinks were risen in union.  
“Well, that’s not always true,” said Heloise. Everyone looked at her, waiting for elaboration.  
“I thought you were super into feminism,” said Jackie.  
“I am!” Heloise backtracked. “I’m just saying… you could teach him.”  
“What, teach him how to fuck?” Everyone laughed.  
“No! No, no,” she raised her hands a little too dismissively. “I mean, you can train him to be perfect for just you. It’s not one-size-fits all, right? Why settle for generic?”  
“Okay, I hear you, girl. Custom designed,” Jackie agreed. Heloise relaxed. She played that one off well.  
“You’ve got to teach him how to pleasure you,” she continued dreamily. “And don’t let it be easy. Make him your servant. Keep him begging for it. Tease him until he’s desperate, and then give him just a little taste. Just enough to drive him crazy. Enough to leave him needing more.”  
“Alright Heloise, calm down over there. Drink your water, girl.” Laughter again. Embarrassed, she sipped the ice-cold water. She definitely had enjoyed that conversation a little too much. Her mind was still spinning, but it had been for a while now.

“It’s true, though,” said Sonya. “Men these days barely even know how to eat pussy.” As she was talking, the waiter had appeared behind her.  
“Well, ladies, right now we’re just going to eat breakfast,” he said, placing their dishes on the table. An uproar from the group. The waiter winked at them and walked away.  
“He’s fly,” said Melissa. “And funny. One of us should fuck him.”  
“Jesus Mel! Anyway,” Sonya cut back in, “I was gonna say, men might not be shit, but I just met a cute girl the other night, and she definitely knows what she’s doing.” Sonya was instantly bombarded with questions about this new woman as she smugly sipped her drink, knowing she had just dropped a bombshell.  
“Actually,” she said. “I told her we were gonna be here today, so you might get the chance to meet her. Not sure though, she’s kind of flakey.”

Heloise was barely listening. She floated in and out of a haze of deviant fantasies, a half smile stuck on her face. What would happen if she gave him more than a little taste? That would be so wrong of her. She burned at the thought. He’s been so good, give him what he deserves. She shivered, closing her eyes. What if instead he gives me what I deserve? Teach me the lesson this time. Teach me not to tease him like that. Make me suffer the consequences. What would he do to her? Bend her over the table? Fuck, that’s hot.  
But would he even have it in him to do that, though? Probably not. It took so little with him. She would have to show him the ropes, but all the better. It was so satisfying to see that frantic, subservient look in his eyes, letting her take him apart piece by piece…

“Heloise, you good?”  
“Huh?” She felt dazed.  
“What’s gotten into you? Oh look! Guys, there she is! She actually showed up! The girl I was telling you about!”

At the entrance stood a tall and very beautiful woman. She looked even taller due to the height of her huge, curly black hair. 

It was Deja Thomas.

Sonya waved her over to their table. She strode over in thin-heeled black boots, then stopped in front of the table and lowered her reflective sunglasses.  
“Heloise,” she said.

“Hello, Deja!” Sonya beamed. “Sit down! Everyone, I’d like you to meet Deja. Deja, this is Kim, Heloise, Jackie, and Melissa.” Heloise waved at her weakly. Deja took a seat next to Sonya and immediately draped an arm around her shoulders, one hand playing with her hair.  
“What’s up, hoes?”  
The waiter returned to their table when he spotted the new customer.  
“Can I get you anything, ma’am?”  
“Yeah, get me a Bloody Mary and two eggs. Sunny-side up.” She turned back to face the other girls. “Sorry, I’m kind of hungover. Hence the shades. What are we talking about?”  
“Boys,” said Melissa.  
“Ugh,” Deja grimaced. “I told you I was nauseous.”  
A round of laughter.  
“What do you do for work, Deja?” asked Kim.  
“I don’t have a job,” said Deja.

Of course she’s unemployed, thought Heloise, sipping her water. She must’ve been making a judgmental expression because Deja narrowed her eyes with an affronted look and asked, “And what do you do, Heloise?”  
“I’m a psychiatric nurse,” said Heloise.  
“That’s funny,” said Deja humorlessly.

“They still got you working with those little demon kids?” asked Melissa.  
“Y-yes, well, only two of them are really what I’d call… kids, or... you know, little kids,” Heloise stammered.  
“I thought you said that the oldest was still like a teenager or something?”  
Heloise’s insides twisted. “Excuse me one moment!” she said, and ran for the bathroom.

In the mirror, Heloise’s face was pale. She splashed some water on it and paced back and forth, her blood running cold. Calm down, she told herself. This really isn’t the time. Just get back out there and act normal. She checked her reflection in the mirror again. You’re disgusting. 

“Why are you here?”  
Heloise stopped on her way back to the table and turned to see Deja up at the bar alone, waiting for her drink.  
“Excuse me?! These are my friends. It’s not like I knew you were coming.” Oddly, the return of her anger felt comforting, bubbling once again over the surface of her guilt and drowning out her internal monologue.  
“I mean, why’d you come to America?”  
“What?” That was random. Why did she care? “I wanted to see L.A., and I got offered a position here. And besides, I like to travel. I never spend too much time in one place.”  
“Yeah, I can see why.”  
“What the fuck is that supposed to mean?”  
“It means you’re messy, Heloise. You make a mess and then walk out so you don’t have to clean it up.”  
“Me?” she spat. “Look who’s talking! And no one would ever say that about me. I am the opposite of messy! I am composed!”  
“Don’t you remember how we got in trouble last week?”  
“Yeah, well. That was one time,” she fought.  
“And if you’re not messy, why didn’t you tell your friends that we already know each other?”  
“I am not messy. I’m put together. Ask anyone who knows me.”  
“Maybe they don’t know you very well, then.”  
“As if! Like you do?!”  
Deja shrugged and sauntered back to the table, Heloise behind her.

Deja’s face transformed into a pleasant smile as Sonya greeted her. Kim moved over to allow Heloise some room in the booth. 

“Welcome back, ladies.” The conversation had screeched to a stop abruptly on their return, indicating that the group was clearly discussing their initial thoughts on Deja.  
“So, is anyone else seeing someone new?” Melissa asked.  
A chorus of murmured “no”s and “not me”s.  
“Heloise, we all saw you daydreaming earlier. Don't hold out on us, I know there’s something going on!” she cheered playfully.  
“Oh, no, nothing. You know boring old me, way too focused on my work.”  
“That’s weird,” said Deja. “I thought you mentioned someone before.”

Is this what having an enemy feels like?

“What? When?” asked Sonya. 

Everyone was looking at her. 

“Um, this is awkward, but me and Deja actually have already met. We ran into each other at the club last weekend. I didn’t say anything because I didn’t know how to bring it up without it being weird, I’m sorry, Sonya. I only made it weirder.”  
Sonya laughed. “That’s not weird at all! Why would that be weird? You could’ve just told me. Wait, I thought you hated clubbing?”  
“I- I like it… sometimes.”  
“So who’s this new guy?”  
“There is no new guy.”

“Secrets, secrets,” said Deja, twirling her straw amusedly.

“I’m pretty sure what I said was that I wasn’t in a relationship,” Heloise snarled through her teeth. “And I told you that nothing happened.”  
“Nothing happened with who?”  
“No one. I’m not seeing anyone. I told you, I’m focusing on my work.”

“Whoa, what’s going on?” Sonya asked. The mood at the table had changed drastically. Everyone looked uneasy, glancing between Deja and Heloise.  
“Must’ve been a misunderstanding,” Deja said smoothly. “You guys should try the Bloody Marys at this place. This round’s on me.” Just like that, the positive atmosphere returned.  
She really can do anything, thought Heloise.

The girls were calling the waiter back over excitedly.  
“I’m gonna sit this one out, guys,” Heloise said. “I don’t really feel like drinking. I’m heading out. I’ve got a lot to do today.”  
As she bid her goodbyes to the group, she could swear she detected a malicious glint in Deja’s eye. 

Must just be her guilty conscience. 

AUGUST 28th, MONDAY AFTERNOON

Heloise was applying scarlet lipstick in the small, dingy one person bathroom. She popped her lips in the mirror, then took a tiny swab of the lipstick and rubbed it lightly into her cheeks, giving her a faintly flushed, seductive look.  
She had her headphones on, enjoying her unexpected break from work to the fullest extent. Her Walkman was tucked away in her purse, and the cord stretched tight as she flounced to the music, the volume much too high to be considered safe or advisable.

Talking's fine if you've got the time  
But I ain't got the time to spare

She turned around a couple times, then unfastened the top button of her uniform to reveal just a hint of cleavage. She grabbed her pink perfume bottle from her purse, emblazoned with the cursive words “Island Fantasy”, and sprayed a little bit into her hair. She gave herself a sultry look.

She’d just come back from lunch when Dr. Scratchnsniff informed her that her presence had been requested in the classroom. She was given no other information, but it wasn’t hard to put two and two together as to the reason she may have been called down without the doctor. She’d been building a reputation as somewhat of a miracle worker among her colleagues as a consequence of her mysterious ability to make a good boy out of Yakko Warner.

She stepped outside and breathed in the pleasant, mild air. Summer was coming to an end. As she made her way to the schoolhouse, it occurred to her how ridiculous it was that she’d been chastised for requesting her own receptionist on staff whilst the studio apparently had the budget to throw away money on a school. And they’d said a psychiatric clinic was unnecessary. She mouthed the chorus of the song quietly, bobbing her head to the beat.

Do you wanna touch, do you wanna touch  
Do you wanna touch me there? 

She wandered inside, lost. She hadn’t been told which room she was looking for. A poster on the wall advertised night acting classes for adults taught by a handful of C list celebrities, their cheesy mugs plastered crudely on the wall in full color. She continued down the hallway, her steps echoing. Was no one even here? 

She climbed up to the second floor and stopped to gaze out of the large window. Like a siren song, the palm trees swayed invitingly over the sun-drenched rooftops, beckoning onlookers to abandon responsibility and lay out in their shade.  
The music was now too upbeat for the mood evoked by this serene view, so she pressed pause on her Walkman. Instantly she knew where she should be heading, if the sounds of chaos were anything to go off of. She continued up the stairs and stopped outside of a wooden door, listening. She knocked twice.  
Ms. Flamiel opened the door, an intimidating glare on her face.  
“Come in,” she said.  
Heloise walked into the room. She’d no sooner placed one high-heeled shoe on the classroom floor before she heard an offended grunt behind her.  
“Miss Nerz, please take off those headphones. Honestly, I can’t think of anything more disrespectful. Young people just aren’t raised right anymore.”

Excuse me, bitch? She took them off quickly and placed them in her bag with a contrite smile. Is that better, you absolute ogre?

“I apologize, Ms. Flamiel. How may I help you today?” 

“It’s about Yakko.”  
She assumed it must be.  
Ms. Flamiel gestured to the blackboard. There he was, drawing something with chalk that was hard to make out from the other side of the room. “School is going to start again soon, and I’ve heard a lot about your success with him. I’ve called you both here because I was hoping I could examine your methods to produce the same response from him.”  
“Well, that’s unlikely,” said Yakko, appearing by her side. Heloise covered her mouth a little too late to keep herself from laughing, and received a stern look from Ms. Flamiel. This was going to be interesting.

Ms. Flamiel turned to Yakko angrily and opened her mouth to speak. Heloise cut her off.

“Oh, Yakko, would you sit down for me, please?” she asked in her sweetest voice, swinging one hip out to the side.

He visibly struggled with the choice between playing Heloise’s game and preventing Ms. Flamiel from believing that he would ever obey a direct command, but it only took him a moment to decide.

He sat down at the closest desk ceremoniously and gave her a winning smile, hands folded politely in front of him.

Ms. Flamiel was regarding Heloise with an almost disturbed look, as if she’d just witnessed some Satanic ritual of black magic. She furrowed her eyebrows, waiting for Heloise to continue with a nod of her head.

“Did you do your homework this weekend, Yakko?” Heloise hummed, gliding over to him. She brushed her fingertips against the desk.

“Of course I did,” he pouted innocently and rested his head on his hand. “I just couldn’t wait to get started on it, so I finished it as soon as I got home. And you’ll be pleased to know that I thought about our discussion the entire time. I can’t wait to tell you all about it in our next session.”  
Heloise bit her lip. So, he wanted to be bold today. He better be ready, then. 

Ms. Flamiel’s bewilderment appeared to be giving her a migraine.  
“I don’t understand,” she said. “He never does his homework.”  
Heloise tilted her head in fake confusion. “That’s odd,” she said. “He always has for me. He’s usually the one asking me to give it to him.”

“So you would say that you’ve been able to make a lot of progress with him?”

Heloise grinned pleasantly at Ms. Flamiel. “Oh yes,” she sang. “I sure have, and I can confidently say that I could easily see us going a lot farther.” She could hear Yakko nearly fall out of his chair. Her grin broadened.

“And you think he’ll be receptive to that?”

“Well, I think so,” she said contemplatively, tapping a finger on her chin. “Yakko, would you be open to the idea of us taking it a lot farther?”

He looked away from her quickly, hugging his shoulder as though struck by sudden shyness. He stared down at the desk. 

"Yakko?" 

"Mm." 

"Is that what you want, Yakko? Tell us." 

“Uh. If- if that’s what… you want,” he fidgeted. His mischievous confidence was gone, replaced by a fiery blush and a barely concealed need in his eyes that had become very familiar to her. That was easy. 

Heloise beamed at Ms. Flamiel, who looked enraged by her effortless success.  
“What kind of approach have you been using in your sessions?”

“All Yakko really needs,” Heloise said, touching his arm lightly, “is a gentle hand.”  
“And you’re prepared to give that to him?”  
“Oh, yes, if he can show me that he’s earned it,” she replied. His breathing escalated.

Ms. Flamiel gave a frustrated sigh and aligned the papers in front of her. “Miss Nerz, I have to say, I’ve had the exact opposite experience. It seems like I can never be firm enough with him.”  
“Interesting that you say that,” Heloise remarked. “I’ve found that he can actually be the one to get quite firm with me.”  
“And that doesn’t bother you?”  
“Oh, not at all. I’ve actually been talking to him a lot about ways to channel that energy.”  
“I see.”

Ms. Flamiel looked like she’d just realized she stepped in dog shit. Yakko looked like he just realized he’d won the lottery. Heloise decided it was time to wrap it up.

“I see a lot of potential in Yakko,” she said. “He’s very smart and a fast learner. I’m eager to see him prove his capabilities to me in new challenges.”  
Ms. Flamiel cleared her throat. “You’re both dismissed,” she grumbled.  
“Have a great day, Ms. Flamiel,” said Heloise. She picked up her purse and pointedly put the headphones back on before walking out the door. 

She had just reached the first floor, gazing again out of that big, beautiful window, when she heard footsteps running down the hallway after her. Here we go, she thought.

“Did you- really- mean- all- those- things you- said?” Yakko wheezed, skidding to a halt at the bottom of the stairs, doubled over as he caught his breath.

“Why, of course,” said Heloise professionally. “You do have great potential. I’ll see you on Thursday, Mr. Warner.” She turned and continued back down the hall.

Unable to stop herself, she looked back one last time before reaching for the door handle. Yakko was still standing where she left him, watching her with an enthralled smile on his face. She couldn’t help but smile, too. 

Wait, did she mean those things?

AUGUST 31st, THURSDAY EVENING

Heloise’s bedside alarm clock had gone off at seven, but she’d already been up for an hour. She’d risen with the sun and sprang out of bed not a moment after opening her eyes, surging with excitement. It was her new favorite day of the week.  
She’d started her usual pot of coffee, but decided she didn’t need the caffeine. Instead, bursting with energy, she’d gone for an early morning run, hoping to shake some of the jitters out of her system. As the late summer sky lit up in blossoms of pink and orange, her sneakers pounded the pavement, dancing to the beat of her heart.

Heloise stepped out of the shower and laid her uniform and hat out on her bed, toweling off her hair. She dragged open her dresser drawer on autopilot, reaching for her usual beige work day bra, but hesitated as a semi-obscured pool of lace and shiny satin stuffed in the corner caught her eye. She ran her hands over the garment. It was her “fuck me” lingerie, expensive, luscious, and seldom used. She pulled the set out and laid it on the bed beside her uniform.

The sight of her no-nonsense, starched white uniform next to the lascivious costume stirred her interest. In front of the mirror, she slowly dressed herself in it. Delicate black lace stockings fastened to a crimson garter belt, the tight straps pulled taut over her thighs and ass. The black thong served little purpose as an actual article of clothing, and what it did cover was still half visible through the wispy mesh. She fastened the red balconette push-up bra, elevating her tits to truly majestic heights. Her round cleavage spilled over rebelliously, jiggling as she posed for her reflection.  
She pulled her uniform on over the lingerie, and the devious set was completely hidden, unbeknownst to anyone but her. 

Unless she decided to give somebody a little glimpse. Fuck. He’d probably jizz himself again, like the horny little virgin he was. Oh, fuck.

It was only 7:30 AM and she was already feeling turned on. She slid one hand between her legs, stroking herself through the sheer material. She looked at the clock again. There was time for a quick one before work. 

The day crept by slowly. She spent most of it filling medications and doing paperwork. Fluoxetine for Larson. Check. Take 20 mg per day at a consistent time, do not exceed recommended dose. Lorazepam for Bates. Take 1-2 daily at bedtime, do not combine with alcohol. Check. She bounced her leg impatiently, finding it very hard to focus. Each minute seemed to take about an hour.

“Miss Nerz?” called Dr. Scratchnsniff from the office. She made her way inside.  
“I vanted to remind you zaht you have another one-on-one session zis evening at six. I vill be taking ze other two vith me. Zank you again for doing zis.”  
“It’s my pleasure, doctor,” she said sincerely, and returned to her work.

After what felt like a lifetime, she was finally alone in the office, waiting for her session to begin. She got up and opened the window, letting in the breeze. No, close it. Actually, open is better. Girl, pull yourself together.  
She sat at the desk and took a couple of deep breaths. You need to remember your boundaries, she scolded herself.  
She picked up her pen and turned it in her fingers a couple of times. Right, right. What boundaries were those again?

She jumped to her feet when she heard a knock on the door, dropping the pen on the desk with a clatter.

Yakko looked up at her courteously.  
“Hello, Nurse,” he said, his polite tone betrayed only by the small, coquettish smile flitting unrestrained across his face.  
“Good evening, Mr. Warner,” she mimicked in a similarly false businesslike manner. She closed the door behind him. “How have you been?”

He stayed in place. “Well, I’m glad you ask, nurse,” he began dramatically, sounding very much like he’d rehearsed this. He probably had, thought Heloise. “Since our last meeting, I have been haunted by strange and perplexing dreams. Visions, one might say. Perhaps of the future.”

She struggled not to laugh. He was being so ridiculous, but she was hanging on to every word. 

“Most unusual, Mr. Warner. And what happens in these visions?”  
He rubbed his temples theatrically. “Ahhh, it’s hard to explain. Maybe it would be easier if I just showed you.” The last words tumbled out a little too fast.  
“Very well, go ahead.”  
His face lit up. “Really?!”  
She stifled a laugh. It was kind of cute that he was so-

He took two steps forward and kissed her on the lips.

She stumbled backwards as though she’d been shot.

“I- I can’t believe you just did that,” she breathed. Her knees hit the back of the chaise longue, and she sat slumped against the wall, the tips of her fingers ghosting over her mouth. Her stomach was churning. She felt drunk.

Tell him to leave right now. You’ve just crossed a line that you can never go back from, ever. This thing has gone way too far, but if you end it now, you can still say you did nothing wrong.

He was looking at the ground dejectedly, despair written all over his face. 

“Show me what happens next,” she said.

His eyes were wide. She gently took both of his hands and pulled him down onto the chaise longue with her. 

She lay back on the red velvet, spreading her body out onto the cushions, her blonde hair spooling weightlessly around the head rest. Sitting motionless, Yakko watched, transfixed, as she outstretched one leg, her white skirt riding up to reveal a few more inches of her suntanned thighs. The stretched red suspender straps of her garter belt peeked out provocatively. She brushed her stockinged knee against him and he shook like he’d been branded by a hot iron.

“Come on,” she purred. “Don’t you want to show me what else you can do?”

“I-I didn’t... really think I’d get this far,” he whispered, astonished. She hid her amusement once more. She was finding his awkwardness rather charming.

“Might I make a few suggestions, then?” she murmured, stroking his face with one fingertip. He nodded emphatically, leaning into her touch.

She took his hand again and placed it beside her shoulder, drawing his body down so that he was positioned above her, inches from her face. He instinctively moved further onto the cushion, kneeling between her legs, and she wrapped her thigh around his waist, forcing his hips down onto hers. He let out a surprised gasp.

Heloise reached out and brought his head forward to meet her own. She gave him a real kiss this time, slow and steadfast, and he moaned contentedly, eyes closed. Her hat slipped off and hit the floor, unnoticed. And as she kissed him, she felt his fingers exploring her hair, then her shoulders, trailing down her collarbone, and stopping uncertainly above her breast.

Without breaking the kiss, she took his hand in hers, bringing it to its destination, and he made a broken noise against her lips, bucking his hips forward. He fondled her firm, full breast through the fabric, caressing the soft slope of the underside with his thumb, and she could feel his heart hammering in his chest. She slid her hand down his side from his shoulders to hips, marveling at his tight, slim body, long and lanky in the peak stages of its transition to manhood. He was grinding his erection against her rhythmically. She wondered if he even realized that he was doing that.

She closed her eyes again and let her body rock steadily with each push. The brazen motion of his undisguised desire was filling her up slowly with white-hot anticipation, and it took all of the willpower she had to let him take his time.

He broke away, looking ashamed. “I- I’m going to…” He trailed off.

Heloise propped herself up on one elbow.  
“Yakko, something that a lot of men do to last longer is to just, you know,” she waved her hand, “think about baseball.”  
“Baseball?!” he repeated incredulously.  
“That’s just an expression. Focus on something boring, or recite something you’ve memorized until the feeling passes.”  
He opened his mouth.  
“In your head!” she ordered. “For fuck’s sake! If I hear the name of even one goddamn country I’m going to get up and leave you here.”  
He closed his mouth.

They looked at each other for a moment and then both started laughing. For a moment, it felt to Heloise as if the surreal, dreamlike atmosphere had dissipated and she’d surfaced back into the real world from the depths of a heady, captivating spell. But the moment of clarity was quickly severed when he pushed her back down onto the headrest and began kissing her neck and- ohmygod, is that a fang?

She tilted her chin up to the ceiling, exposing her throat to him and moaning in satisfaction. The sharp, pointed tooth nipped at her flesh dangerously, catching on her skin in a way that was both certain to leave marks and saddle her with a new and exhilarating fetish. She threw her arms up above her head as he moved farther down, defacing her with tingling little abrasions down from her neck to her chest. Over her heart, all four fangs scraped her skin at once and she released a thrilled whine. Yakko smirked at her.

Heloise found that she was now the one subconsciously rolling her hips into him, rocking their bodies together even more furiously than before. Were there other fun surprises? She grabbed at his back wildly, desperate for more right the fuck now.

“Are you ready for this?” she managed to pant, and he looked up to give her an enthusiastic nod. Then he brought his mouth back down to her breast and her whole body shuddered. She reached frantically for his gold belt buckle, making sure to brush her fingers against the straining tent in his pants on the way there. 

“Ah, my knees are not vaht zey used to be. Vould someone get the door for me, please?” In one heart-stopping moment, the unmistakable voice of Dr. Scratchnsniff resonated nightmarishly from the hall. Heloise and Yakko jolted, their heads snapping simultaneously to the door in sheer horror.

The doorknob turned and the door swung open. 

It was Dot. She stood stunned, her foot hanging in the air mid-step. 

Directly across the room from her, Yakko and Heloise were frozen in a very horizontal tableau on the chaise longue. One of her legs was wrapped around his waist, hitching her skirt up around her hips as he pressed her into the red velvet. One of his arms was behind her shoulders, lifting her body up to his, and the other was cupping her left breast, where the skin under her uniform looked as though she’d narrowly escaped being torn apart by a hungry pack of wolves. She was using one hand to claw at his back, whilst the other had been at work unbuckling his belt. And both of their faces were turned solemnly towards Dot, the Fear of God flashing identically in all four eyes. 

She looked at them.

They looked at her.

Then Dot opened her mouth and let out an ear-piercing shriek with the powerful force of an otherworldly being.

“FIRE!!!!” She slammed the door shut behind her as she ran back out into the hall. “THE BUILDING’S ON FIRE AND EVERYBODY BETTER GET OUTSIDE RIGHT NOW!!! GET OUT!” 

There arose a cacophony of panicked shouts and the stomping of dozens of feet trampling their way down the stairs. The fire alarm began to blare deafeningly and the sprinklers sputtered on. Instantly Heloise and Yakko were drenched in tepid water. The new, untouched computer emitted an electrical sound and a couple of sparks flew from it.

Heloise pushed Yakko off of her and they both ran for the door. In the hallway, they looked at each other once, then took off in opposite directions, Heloise joining the mob running for the front exit and Yakko to the side.

Yakko weaved through the curious crowds gathered in the lot, each onlooker equal parts grateful for the exciting interruption to their workday and eager to swap wild conjectures as to who was responsible for burning down the building. 

“It was Gerald,” accused one woman. “You know how he can’t go one hour without heating up a bag of that disgusting butter soup he calls popcorn.” The group peered suspiciously at the circle of colleagues to their right, who were already giving them the same mistrustful glare. Yakko elbowed past them and they each recoiled at his wet fur. 

Finally he spotted Dot, hidden in a circle of angry firemen. She was batting her eyelashes at them and twirling her skirt innocently.  
“Oops!” she giggled. “Guess I was wrong.” She leaped out from between them and bounded away.  
“Definitely a prank,” the tallest firefighter said irritably from beneath his handlebar mustache. “Waste our time, why don’t you. You know, there’s only one thing worse than being called out for a real fire.”  
The teammate on his left followed his gaze back to Dot.  
“A child?” he asked confusedly.  
“No.”

Yakko made his way over to her as she began wandering off, indifferent to the mayhem behind her. 

“Dot!” he called.

“Aghhhhhhhh!” she gagged, slapping a hand over her eyes as if maced. “Ew, get away from me! I can’t look at you until I’ve bleached my eyeballs about fifty times.”  
He placed a hand on her shoulder. “Thank-”  
“AGHHHH!!!” she wrenched herself away and bent over with her hands on her knees, convulsing like a cat about to vomit and performing loud retching sounds, her tongue hanging out absurdly. “Oh, gross!” She raised her shoulder and looked at it in utter revulsion. “I can’t believe you just touched me with those nasty hands!”  
She began walking away again, yelling behind her, “You owe me big until the day you drop dead!”  
He ran to keep up with her. “We-”  
“Do you really want that day to be today?!” she screamed.

Wakko skipped up to them. “There you guys are!” he beamed. “Did you hear the building is gonna esplode?”  
Dot smiled at him. “Great news! Yakko’s decided to stop ditching us all the time and come back to group therapy.”  
“Oh, yay!” Wakko clapped. “It was so boring without you!” He hugged his brother gleefully, then said, “Ew, why are you wet?”


	6. The First Two Weeks of December

DECEMBER 8TH, THURSDAY NIGHT

In the streets, gleaming golden lights shone down affectionately on the joyful masses below as they wandered lightheartedly before each ornately decorated storefront window. Red scarves and coats hugged the chilly merrymakers as they happily selected gifts for their loved ones, but Heloise’s blood ran stronger than that of the native Californians, whose temperate, windy December nights knew only a poor mockery of Québec’s glacial winter frost.  
Festive singing drifted through the night air. Throughout the country, Christmas cheer had come early and stronger than ever before, and there was one person responsible. Mariah Carey had released a Christmas album back in the end of October, laden with upbeat dance tracks rather than the usual somber carols or worn-out midcentury jazz, which prompted a nationwide scramble to the record store, everyone who’s anyone hoping to get their hands on a tape to play at their parties this year before it sold out. There was one particular song that Heloise seemed to have already heard thirty times over, despite it only being the first week of December, and it seemed that each time she left the house, all she could hear was Mariah begging for the reciprocation of affection from a long-lost lover. 

The couple walking on the sidewalk in front of her stopped and gazed into one another’s eyes underneath suspiciously plastic-looking mistletoe, gloved hands entwined devotedly as they leaned in for a kiss.  
Heloise bitterly elbowed past them. We get it, you’re happy.

Heloise herself had not been kissed since the day of the false fire three months ago. A sharp ache surfaced in her chest at the memory of it. It was ironic that at one time, all she’d wanted was for life to go back to normal, because now she spent her days grieving the loss of those three hot, feverish weeks of summer. When she woke up each morning, she mourned the adrenaline of a secret, developing thrill, replacing her need for caffeine and bringing electric anticipation to her morning commute. And some nights, before she drifted off to sleep, she would pinch the sensitive skin of her throat between her scarlet nails, submitting to the imaginary fangs of an aroused beast, worshipful and hungry for a first taste of her body, and she’d cum hard against her vibrator.

When Dr. Scratchnsniff told her on Wednesday of that next week that she wouldn’t be having a private session with Yakko and could instead go home early, he seemed to expect her gratitude. Instead, it felt like she’d been slapped. When she asked for an explanation, all he said was that Yakko had asked to be put back into the group sessions. It had to be a misunderstanding, she had thought. She needed to talk to him about it in person. 

She’d stretched her excuses for staying in the office until six that Thursday as far as they could possibly go, and then realized that she had no credible reason to ask to speak to Yakko privately. Nevertheless, she couldn’t bring herself to go home without answers, so she interrupted the group session, pretending she had left her purse in the room. Immediately, Dot had asked her how her studies were coming along on her animal handling degree, which caused Dr. Scratchnsniff to question her about it. She was forced to improvise a story that she was actually studying to be an animal handler as a side job, which caused Dot to laugh so hard she cried. It was all Heloise could do to even escape the situation. 

Without the private sessions, Heloise ran into Yakko sparingly, and when she did, one or both of them was always surrounded by others, with no feasible explanation to break away. As weeks turned into months, it felt as though it was too late to continue whatever it was they had started. 

And so, life had resumed as though the illicit events of August had never happened. She convinced herself that it was for the best. Their short, clandestine affair would never have ended well. Either they chose to cut it off like this, or they’d be caught eventually, and her career would be in ruin. Hell, they had been caught, she was just lucky that it wasn’t Dr. Scratchnsniff who walked through that door. She was being given a second chance to straighten out her moral compass and avoid making a critical mistake.

But did he regret what had happened? Worse, did he resent her for it? Maybe he thought of her as a predator. Maybe he was afraid of her. That thought hurt. Maybe he was just fine, and it was nothing but a passing amusement. Maybe he’d even gone and bragged about how far she’d let him go with her, not that anyone would ever believe him. She’d still prefer that to resentment. 

There was no way to know how he felt, but she’d learned to live with not knowing. It was resolutely in the past.

But in her dreams, the sounds of traffic floated through the open office window, the dancing palm trees glowing orange under the hot, sweet sunset, as she lay pinned to the chaise longue, her skin lighting up everywhere under Yakko’s exploring touch. In the dizzying heat, barely stirred by the whirring metal fan, she would let him undress her slowly, and he’d kiss each new inch of exposed skin, until she finally let him penetrate her for the first time. The climax of each dream was always his reaction to this new sensation, and ended with that satisfied moan he’d made when she’d seen him orgasm in the darkened office that day, eyelids fluttering to the sound of her teasing voice.

She awakened from that very dream on the eighth of December, the ripples of arousal dissipating quickly as she returned to the drudgery of her same boring morning routine, wishing she could sleep in and get back to the fantasy rather than go to work. While drinking her morning coffee, she casually skimmed the newspaper for any mention of nursing positions opening up at nearby clinics and hospitals. It wasn’t that she was seriously considering leaving the studio, and she had no real reason to go, but things had become dull. The idea of breaking away from the monotony at least made her feel as though there were something to look forward to.

On her commute this morning, the bus driver was playing music over a cheap, tinny stereo system. At the moment, it seemed that the station hosts were taking a break from the onslaught of Mariah Carey in exchange for a turn with Elvis’ deep, alluring croon.

I’ll have a blue Christmas without you  
I’ll be so blue just thinking about you

She was sipping her coffee grouchily and staring out the window, not taking in any of the cheerful holiday scene outside. She made a halfhearted attempt to get back into the dream narrative, but it never worked right when she was awake. She closed her eyes and tried to picture her imaginary Yakko sinking into her, his face flushed, lips parted in arousal. Would he even last long enough to put it in her or would he bust all over himself as soon as she told him he could hit it? And why did she never make him wear a condom in her fantasies?  
She opened her eyes. Oh my god, it’s not real, it doesn’t matter. She brought her coffee up to her lips.  
Well, he was a virgin, so he obviously wasn’t carrying anything, and she knew she was clean. It’s not like he could impregnate her. Could he? She furrowed her eyebrows, immensely disturbed by that train of thought.  
Okay, say for the sake of argument that he can’t impregnate her and they’re both clean, she should still be teaching him how to have safe sex. God damn it Heloise, you shouldn’t be teaching him how to have sex at all. For fuck’s sake.

Well, it’s not like I could if I wanted to, she thought mournfully, tapping the coffee cup with both thumbs. She looked at her tired reflection in the window. “If” was a lenient word.

Work dragged on uneventfully as always. The only distinguishable difference between that day and all the others was Dr. Scratchnsniff’s reminder that their department was required to attend a holiday planning meeting in the evening with a small group of other full-time staff members. How wonderful, staying at work even longer than expected and returning home in the dark after the winter sunset.

They made their way to the conference room at five, opening the door to find about fifteen folding chairs arranged in a circle. The room was decorated with paper snowflakes and sparkly red garlands of tinsel. Christmas music was playing over a small boombox plugged into the wall. On a festive tablecloth sat three bowls of cheap snacks, which were being quickly devoured by Wakko Warner. Adorably, he and his siblings were wearing matching scarves.

Heloise took a deep breath. This meeting was going to be even harder to get through than she anticipated. She perched on one of the plastic chairs and tried to find something other than Yakko to look at. Nightmare. She had the idea to make it seem like she was deep in conversation.

“So, what’s this all about?” She asked the woman on her right.  
“The Team Spirit Committee takes its responsibilities very seriously. We want everyone who works here to feel represented throughout the holiday season regardless of religion or lack thereof that they choose to participate in.” Heloise nodded interestedly. "Regardless, we can all enjoy a little bit of cheer and celebration in a safe and work appropriate manner. Therefore, it is imperative that we make sure to plan for an inclusive and fun atmosphere for all, be that through themed parties or-”

“Alright everyone, let’s get started,” said Thaddeus Plotz, waddling in through the door. Heloise was surprised that he would be willing to stay at the studio late, but perhaps that was the reason he was trying to get the meeting moving along.

The group filled in the circle of chairs. Why’d it have to be a circle? Meetings are bad enough, why do we all have to look at each other? She kept her eyes fixed on the floor, but was well aware of the Warners sitting directly across from her.

Plotz sat at the chair closest to the door and pulled a clipboard out of his briefcase. He skimmed it unenthusiastically, stopping at the last page.

“Let’s do the Secret Santa first. Who has a hat?” He asked.  
“Oh! I do!” Wakko called, his hand in the air.

“Okay, pass it over here so we can pull the names from it,” said Plotz.  
“No, it’s mine,” said Wakko, pulling it tightly over his head as though someone would snatch it at any moment.  
“Just give him your hat,” Yakko whispered extremely loudly.  
“But people are gonna touch it and get their gross fingers all over it,” Wakko whispered back, similarly at his normal speaking volume. “We don’t know where their fingers have been. And what if someone steals it?” He gave each of them wary looks, one by one.  
“No one’s gonna steal your hat,” said Yakko.  
“How do you know?”  
“Because no one would want it. And anyway, if they do, I’ll buy you a new one. It’s worth, like, ten cents.”  
“But I like this one!” Wakko wailed.

“Oh, for the love of God,” Plotz groaned, looking at his watch.

Yakko tried to take the hat off of Wakko’s head, and Wakko shrieked as though he was being attacked, smacking his elbow into the man on his left, who spilled his plastic cup of orange soda onto the carpet and all over his shoes.

“I have a hat,” said Heloise, taking her hat off and tossing it to Plotz. It sailed in a perfect arc towards him, but he still somehow managed to miss it, and ended up having to crawl under his chair to retrieve it like a balding, middle-aged man baby.

“Thank you Miss Nerz,” he said, attempting to sound dignified. “I’m going to distribute some paper. Everyone, you know how this works, write your names on your paper and fold it up. We’re going to pull them at random from this hat, and you will be responsible for buying a gift for the person whose name you pick. The budget is fifteen dollars, try not to go over it. Also, please at least try to put some effort in.” He began passing out printer paper. 

Heloise wrote her name in cursive on her paper, then remembered that no one knew how to pronounce her real name, so she scratched it out and wrote “Hello Nurse” instead. Whatever.

“Can you do mine?” Dot’s voice rang out through the scratching of pencils and jingly radio music. She shoved her paper at Yakko, who took it and started writing.  
“Do mine, too,” said Wakko, watching him.

Plotz began going around the circle with Heloise’s hat, and each person dropped in their folded paper.

“I’ll go first,” he said, looking away as he reached for a paper. He unfolded the first one he grabbed. He read it silently, then gave it a confused look. “But… I don’t know who that is,” he said, looking around the group.

“Who?” said Dot.  
“Anita Bath,” he said.

The Warner siblings erupted in laughter. He glared at them, throwing the paper on the ground, and fished for another one.

“Long Wang?” he read aloud. This time the whole circle began laughing at him. He threw this paper on the ground as well and stomped his foot indignantly. 

“Never mind! We’ll just use the attendance sheet instead.” He flipped to the first page on the clipboard and began ripping off tiny pieces of the paper. He struggled to fold while also holding the cumbersome hat and clipboard, continually dropping one or all of the objects on the ground. Everyone sat watching him silently for almost a full five minutes, until finally, he stood up again and dramatically grabbed a piece of paper. He read it silently, then placed it in his pocket. He offered the hat to the man on his right.

As the procession began making its way closer to Heloise, the first few twinkly notes of that omnipresent Mariah Carey song began from the boombox in the corner. 

I don’t want a lot for Christmas  
There is just one thing I need

Dr. Scratchnsniff pulled his paper out of the hat and read it.

I don’t care about the presents  
Underneath the Christmas tree

The group watched as the Team Spirit Committee woman next to Heloise read the name she’d pulled, then cleared her throat and folded it back up.

I just want you for my own  
More than you could ever know

Heloise reached into her hat and grabbed a paper stuck at the very bottom.

Make my wish come true

She unfolded the tiny paper carefully underneath her long, scarlet fingernails.

All I want for Christmas is-

Yakko Warner.

She gasped and immediately looked up at him. A slow smile spread across his face as he registered her surprised stare. He raised his eyebrows at her. 

She glanced back down at the paper in her shaking hand. The name was still there in inky black Times New Roman font. How could this be happening? 

When she looked up, he turned around, pretending to be shocked, and theatrically mouthed the word, “Me?”, one finger pointed to himself. She giggled silently, pressing her lips together. He gave her a surreptitious wink. 

She covered her mouth with one hand to hide her senseless smile. A long-dormant flame had reawakened within her at his secret attention, and she once again felt logic slip away, replaced by a reckless abandon. It commanded her to do away with thinking and let herself be overpowered by the beat of an inviting, insidious drum.

She waited until the end of the meeting, then slipped out of the sliding glass door, around the corner and onto the balcony. She inhaled the chilly night air, intoxicating pleasure entering her lungs rather than oxygen. Like a drug, her skin tingled with goosebumps as she posed in front of the city skyline, expecting to be followed.

“So, Nurse, what are you gonna get me?”  
And there he was, a dark shape barely illuminated by the white fairy lights strung up overhead.  
“Well, Mr. Warner, you’re just going to have to tell me what it is that you want, won’t you,” she murmured coyly, resting both elbows on the railing.  
“Donkey Kong for the Gameboy,” he said instantaneously.

...Um, okay?

He realized his mistake. “Wait! Can I change my answer?”  
“No, you may not,” she called over her shoulder, turning to walk down the staircase. “It’s too late. I’m already on my way to Electronics Boutique.”  
He ran ahead of her and threw one arm in front of the railing, cutting off her access to the stairs. Heat stirred within her. “Can I revise my answer?”  
“You may.”  
“Donkey Kong for the Gameboy… unless, uh, it’s over budget. In that case, I’ll just happily take whatever you’re willing to give me,” he grinned, batting his eyelashes at her.  
“But if it isn’t, then you would rather have Donkey Kong,” she teased.  
“Yeah. Wait, no! What?”  
“So, you think I’m worth fifteen dollars?”

He looked completely bewildered.  
“Uh… no?”

She gasped in mock offense, clutching a hand to her heart. “Why, Mr. Warner, you wound me.”  
“No! That’s not- forget I said anything!” he pleaded desperately.  
“So, you’re saying you don’t want it,” she said.  
“No, I don’t.”  
She placed one shoe on the first step down.  
“Wait! Yes, I do want it! Please come back!”  
She turned back around with an amused smile.  
“Uh,” he said. “Are you still talking about Donkey Kong?”  
She leaned over and trailed one finger down his chest. “Are you?”

He inhaled sharply at her touch, melting like butter under her hand. He took a step towards her and she simultaneously took a step away. A beat, then they repeated the movement, as if performing an awkward, clumsy tango. One more time, and with a jolt, she felt her back meet the metal railing behind them. Catching her balance, she tightened her grasp on his chest, her red-painted fingers tangling tightly into his thick black fur. He yelped as she unintentionally yanked him forward, and she swiftly let go, hand raised apologetically.

He looked at it, then looked at her, and she slowly placed it back on his chest, feeling his heart race under her fingertips. Smothered in shadow, the night felt ethereal and shifting, as if it lived in a dreamlike state halfway between her fantasies and the resurfacing past. 

Cautiously, and without breaking eye contact, he gripped the railing behind her, enclosing her with one arm and wicking out the leftover hesitation in her mind. She looked down at the invasive hand, inches from her waist, and as she turned her head he moved forward and brought his fangs to her throat. 

For a moment, she wildly felt as though she was being attacked by a vampire, but the touch was deliberate and careful, thrillingly sharp without piercing her skin. She couldn’t prevent the satisfied purr from escaping her lips as he continued up her neck, grazing her jawbone and muffling her low noises with a searing kiss. Her toes curled. Maybe it was the Christmas spirit, but in that instant she could swear she heard a bell ring.

He remembered that I like his fangs, she realized. So, he was a fast learner, after all. Well, he’d better take notes. She threw one arm over his shoulder blades, and within seconds, the slow, tender kiss accelerated explosively, tense with the force of the built-up lust that had accumulated during the long wait.

It occurred to her that they were in a public place, in full view of anyone who happened to walk out onto the balcony or look up from the street, but she was entirely consumed with the urge to let him have his way with her. He was pushing her hard against the railing, with one hand lost in her long hair and the other migrating slowly towards the curve of her ass, his breath hitching erratically against her lips as his fingers worked their way down, desperate to discover more of her body.

She broke the kiss to gaze at him, all flushed red and transformed by overwhelming need.

“Look at you,” she said, running her fingernails down the side of his burning face. His dazed, half-closed eyes snapped up to hers. “So hungry for me, just like you always have been. I’m proud of you for even getting this far without making a mess of yourself again. You’ve been touching yourself a lot since last time, haven’t you?”

He blinked at her, afflicted, then nodded shakily.

“What do you like to think about?” 

He bit his lip, blushing, and sheepishly averted his eyes, as if to hide his own nervous embarrassment.

“Yakko, you can tell me,” she hummed, dragging his chin back with one fingertip to face her.

“This,” he whispered.

She smiled sweetly and leaned in to whisper back, “That’s what I think about, too.” She slid her hand further down his firm abdomen until her palm landed upon the insistent lump rising at the front of his pants. He gasped in her ear, eyelids fluttering.

“So, let’s try again. What do you want for Christmas, Mr. Warner?” She asked. As if in answer to her question, she felt the hot bulge swell beneath heavy fabric.

“I want you,” he breathed, his body pressing impatiently against her.

Heloise heard the vulnerable trust in his voice and suddenly her blood ran cold, like a bucket of ice water had been dumped over her skin. What the fuck are you doing?! This is a kid who not moments ago asked you to buy him a video game. She choked and shoved him away, grasping at the railing to avoid tumbling over. The world swam before her eyes.

Fuck, fuck, Jesus fucking Christ.

Yakko was staring at her with a crushed expression. 

She could barely bring herself to look at him.

“Why, though?” Anger was creeping into his voice. “Why’d you avoid me for three months and then you do this, make me think I have a chance, and then-”

“Because you’re a teenager!” She shrieked, her voice piercing shrilly through the December air. “How is that even a question?!”

“Then why are you messing with my head like this? For fun?!”

“I’m not messing with you!” She shouted. “I’m just trying to stop myself from doing something stupid because I want you to fuck me so badly!”

Those last words echoed loudly off the aluminum, bouncing between them and sucking the air from the conversation. His eyes were wide. The rosy red flush had returned fiercely to his cheeks, burning livelier than ever, and he bit his tongue, thinking carefully before continuing.

“You didn’t care last time,” he said finally. To her, that felt like an accusation.

“Last time was wrong. You should be mad at me for last time.”

“But I’m not,” he pleaded.

“It doesn’t matter.” The volume of her voice was escalating again. “You need to be eighteen.” 

“Well, I’m never going to be!” He yelled.

“Then we can never be together! Then you can never understand!” 

Tears came rushing to his eyes. Whatever he had been about to say caught in his throat as he squinted at her, heartbroken.

It was unbearable to see. “I just don’t want to hurt you, Yakko,” she said.

A tear breached his eyelashes and ran down the side of his face, where she’d touched him so tenderly only moments before. You already have, Heloise thought to herself, waiting to hear those painful words.

But instead he said,  
“Then don’t.”

She searched her brain for a response and came up with nothing.

“What’s going-” Dot’s small silhouette had appeared in the flickering light, no doubt having noticed their absence from the conference room and, upon searching for them, grown alarmed by the sound of raised voices. She stopped, horrorstruck, when she saw Yakko crying, as if witnessing a trainwreck.

“What is your problem?!” She yelled at Heloise, sliding a white glove off of one hand. If only I knew, thought Heloise wistfully. Then I could-

Dot sprang forward and struck her across the face.

Pain seared through her flesh, exponentially more intense than she would’ve expected. She brought her hand up to her cheek, only for her fingers to come away sticky. Four long, parallel slashes lacerated her face, beginning to leak long red trails of blood down to her jaw. Claws?!

Yakko towered over Dot, furious.  
“Why would you do that?!” He screamed.

Tears came to her own eyes for a moment before she bristled with retaliatory rage. “I’m only trying to help you, stupid!”

“I didn’t ask for your help!” Then he looked at Heloise. “I can make my own decisions.”

The sound of laughing voices began to emerge from around the corner, the rest of the group coming to join them on the balcony. Heloise wiped her cheek with her stiff white sleeve and found it covered in slick blood, shining black in the cool moonlight. She had to get out of here or questions would be asked.

Her shoes clattered on the metal staircase as she ran for the street. She could hear Yakko calling her, and she hoped to God that he wouldn’t chase after her. As if taking their cue from the others, tears welled up in her eyes, blurring her vision even further, exacerbated by the pain and chaotic emotions of the night. As she turned the corner onto the side streets, the salt of her tears hit her facial wound and stung like a bitch.

DECEMBER 14TH AND 15TH, WEDNESDAY AND THURSDAY (RESPECTIVELY) 

“Okay, I talked to her for you. Are you still mad at me?”  
Yakko opened his eyes blearily from the imprint he’d worn into the couch over the last five days, curled up pathetically in fetal position in unwashed pajama pants. Dot was standing in front of him, arms crossed balefully as if to demand instant forgiveness as thanks for her efforts. He sat up and wrapped the blanket around himself.  
“What- what do you mean you talked to her?”

She shrugged. “I thanked her for having bad taste so that I have a chance with the men around here, and then I, you know, ‘apologized for attacking her’,” she said, rolling her eyes and making air quotes with both hands, “and yeah, we also did maybe talk about you a little bit.” She rocked on her heels. “Um, her face looks a lot better?” She added uneasily.

“What did she say?” Yakko’s heart was racing.  
“She forgave me. That was really nice of her,” Dot said pointedly.  
“No, what did she say about me?”

“Oh,” Dot grimaced. “Yeah… I think she like-likes you.” She made a gagging sound and headed towards the kitchen.  
“What did she say exactly though? Word for word,” he insisted, but Dot was already gone. She like-likes me? Butterflies fluttered through his chest. How did Dot find that out in one conversation so casually, when he had still been unsure after three months? Maybe it was just some kind of telepathy that girls have.

He threw the blanket off and ran into the kitchen to hug her.  
“Thanks, Dot,” he said.  
She dropped her peanut butter toast on the floor facedown. “Ugh, go take a shower,” she said, but she was smiling.

Yakko didn’t have to wait long before he saw Hello Nurse again. He wondered, in fact, if he would have seen her even sooner had he not spent the last five days wallowing in despair. It was the morning of the fourteenth when he stepped into the elevator at the administration building, and there she was, at the back of the crowd, staring straight ahead and holding a folder of papers to her chest. The scratches on her cheekbone had indeed healed well, already fading to white, her breathtaking beauty completely undamaged. He rode the elevator up past his stop, not willing to separate himself from her just yet, and she seemed to have the same idea. One by one, the other passengers stepped out, and as soon as the last one did, she slammed her hand on the “close door” button.  
“Yakko, I want you to know that I spoke to your sister,” she said shakily. Even when wavering like this, her voice was so irresistible, melodic and syrupy, and he only liked the sound of his name when it came from her mouth. Play it cool, he thought to himself.  
“Oh, yeah, she told me,” he said.  
“Oh!” Hello Nurse sounded surprised. She paused for a moment. “So, she told you what I said?” She was running her fingers through her floaty golden hair.  
“Yeah,” he repeated dreamily. She smelled so good, tropical and heavenly as always. He was starting to worry that his body would develop a Pavlovian response to coconuts.  
She was looking at him carefully. “And?”  
He returned to reality. She was waiting for an answer.  
“Uh, yeah?” he guessed, aware that he must sound like a broken record. 

Her face broke out into a stunning smile that stopped his heart, her blue eyes shining sweetly into his own. She hugged the papers tightly, squishing her breasts against them. His eyes darted back and forth between her chest and her face. He wondered what she would do if he kissed her again.  
“I’m so glad to hear that, Mr. Warner,” she sang, and the elevator doors slid open. She gave him one last smile and walked out, leaving him gawking after her, watching her hips and ass flex against her white cotton skirt with each step. Whoa.

It took him a few minutes to realize he was still standing in the elevator, mind empty. He got out at the ground floor, having completely forgotten where he was going, and walked into the blue daylight, euphoric. That conversation went so much better than the last one! I guess she’s changed her mind? He replayed the interaction, trying to recall what it was she’d said, but all he could remember was her cherry red lips slowly forming the syllables of his name and her firm breasts pushing against the folder. He headed towards the water tower, hands in his pockets. Wait, so if they were on good terms again, does that mean- 

He stopped short, mind racing.

Does this mean that for Christmas- she might-

Her voice floated through his mind, echoing what she’d screamed the other night, “Because I want you to fuck me so badly! I want you to fuck me so badly!”

He hurried the rest of the way home like he’d found a golden ticket. Mercifully, no one else was there yet. He lay on his back and palmed himself through his pants, remembering how she’d touched him like this, her voice whispering in his ear and her leg wrapped around him, allowing him room to push closer to-

“Ah-!” After just a couple of strokes, he came onto his stomach, bucking his hips up, his other hand gripping the bedsheets. He panted, eyes shut, as the semen dried, settling firmly into his fur.

Okay, anyway, what she’d said was that she wanted him to fuck her. So does this mean that she’s going to let him? He blinked at the ceiling rapidly. But she’d also said some other things in the past, too, he thought, frowning. Things like “You wouldn’t know what to do with me”, and “I’m surprised you lasted this long.” He looked at the dried jizz on his abdomen. He’d gotten home about two minutes ago.

What if she gave him a chance and he completely disappointed her? Dread filled him. He needed to be better, he thought as he walked to the bathroom to scrub himself off. He looked at himself in the mirror, his face still flushed and his hair fucked up. He winced. Maybe there was actually some way that he could really impress her. He needed to do some research.

The dingy brick store sat hidden between a laundromat and a skeezy apartment building. Black curtains were drawn in each window, blocking the inside view from the public eye, but all modesty was dismissed by the red neon sign “Adult Video Outlet”, glittering beneath the flurry of tiny snowflakes as they melted upon impact, soaking the pavement. Above the door hung another neon sign, this one the outline of a woman lying on her stomach, arching her back seductively.

Yakko stared at the sign, then put on his sunglasses, despite the snow. He had decided to wear a jacket and tie, complete with briefcase and hat, for this outing, in order to give the impression of a nondescript businessman on a typical, everyday shopping trip. An everyday shopping trip for porn.

He took a deep breath, pushed open the door, and instantly experienced sensory overload. From every corner of the store, tapes and posters drew his eye, half-naked women in cheap costumes and lingerie leaning over car hoods and twirling handcuffs. The air was stuffy, and somewhere, one of the videos was playing, the sounds emanating through the nearly empty aisles.  
“Oh, oh, oh, yes please, just like that,” cried the actress lewdly.  
He began to sweat. Focus, focus, just find a tape and then get out.

He put his hands in his pockets indifferently and began to walk down the aisle in a way that he hoped one might describe as normal. Just a normal man, shopping for porn, normally. Maybe he should whistle.

He turned the corner and came face to face with a black magazine labelled “Big Booty Blondes”, the gorgeous model on the cover bending all the way over to look at him from between her legs in shiny, thigh high leather boots, a hot pink thong wedged between her huge asscheeks. Keep moving, he thought, but his feet were stuck to the floor. He stared at the curve of the soft mound between her legs, barely covered by the thin pink fabric, trying to make sense of its shape. He felt himself start to harden. He reached for the magazine. 

“Did you need any help, sir?” Asked a greasy, ponytailed employee.  
Yakko cleared his throat and shook his head, pulling his hat further down over his blushing face. He moved past the man and continued down the aisle, unsure how much longer he could spend in this place.

Oh, here it is. This was perfect.  
The tape was labelled “The Nympho Nurse.” An olive-skinned brunette in a very impractical medical outfit spread her legs on the cover to reveal white underwear decorated with a red first aid cross. She had blue sanitary gloves on, and was stretching a rubber stethoscope between her hands, biting down on a tongue depressor. The subtitle read, “It’s time for your physical!”

“Are you sure that you don’t have any questions?” For some reason, the employee had followed him.  
He stood up as tall as he could. “Oh, uh, no, I-I’ll just be taking this- ah- actually, um, I do have one question, if you don’t mind, sir. Uh, what does ‘nympho’ mean?”  
The man scowled at him. “How old are you?”  
“I’m… thirty-one. But I don’t see why it’s any of your business.”  
The employee sighed. “Do you have any ID to prove that?”  
He pretended to search all of his pockets. “I- must have- left it in my… car, um, I’ll just go and get it,” he said. Then he ran out of the store.  
The man yelled after him before the door closed. “You trying to see some titties, kid?” He laughed. 

In the parking lot, Yakko kicked at the ground defensively. Yeah, and what about it. 

Plan B was the public library, just a short walk downtown in the light sprinkling of snow. The library was quiet, sunlight streaming through the windows, dust caught in its beams, as retirees sat peacefully alone at their tables, poring through their books, and in some cases, sleeping. Yakko felt a lot more comfortable here than he did at the porn store. He cringed, already mortified by the recent memory of that trip. What porn store? He had never tried to go to a porn store.  
He cruised through the quiet aisles, hidden by the tall maze of shelves in the nonfiction science section. Darwinism, Marine Biology, Earth’s Tectonic Plates.  
Oh, this might work. “The Human Body: An Illustrated Anatomical Guide.” On the cover was the face of a man, his musculoskeletal system exposed grotesquely. Yakko pulled the book out from the shelf and brought it over to a counter. He flipped through the table of contents.  
Here! The Female Reproductive System. Excited, he found the page.

But if he’d been overwhelmed at the Adult Video Outlet, he was even more so now. What was he even looking at? He squinted at the diagram in confusion. The illustration was of a red, T-shaped set of muscles. The only labels he recognized were “vagina” and “uterus”, but… that’s really not what he had imagined at all. He’s supposed to fit it in that? The drawing was floating in white space, no body surrounding it. Thinking back to the model on the magazine, it just didn’t make sense. That’s not at all what the photograph had looked like. He looked at the cover of the book again. This couldn’t possibly be right. Was this actually nonfiction?

He glanced around the library, lost, then looked back at the picture. Fallopian Tube. What? There were tubes?  
He closed the book and put it back on the shelf, hopelessly. She was right. He just didn’t know what he was doing. He was sure to disappoint her.

He got up and started back towards the door, but hesitated when he saw the video section, considering. He thought about Kelly McGillis’s sponge bath scene in The Witness. So nice, he’d seen it twice. Maybe a regular movie could work after all.

He flipped through the wooden bins of tapes, unsure what he should be looking for. The Witness was a crime movie about the Amish, and yet it had nudity in it. How was he supposed to know which of these would? Here’s one: The Secret Garden. Was that supposed to sound as sexy as it did? He flipped it over and read the back.

A young British girl is orphaned by an earthquake in India and is sent back to England to live in her uncle’s castle. Soon, she discovers a beautiful garden on the property and explores its secrets. 

It was impossible to tell if that was intended to be sexual, although he suspected that it was. Then he saw the rating: G for General. Oh, it’s just a garden. He put it back. Besides, there was a goat on the cover. He should’ve known.

Sister Act, Of Mice and Men, A League of Their Own, A River Runs Through It. He’d heard of almost all of these. Pretty Woman. This one he’d also heard of, but he had no idea what it was about. On the cover, Julia Roberts grabbed Richard Gere by his necktie, laughing in high heeled boots similar to those worn by the magazine model, who still floated in the corners of his mind. He flipped the tape over.

Edward, a rich entrepreneur, hires Vivian, a prostitute, to accompany him to a few social events. Trouble ensues when he falls in love with her and they try to bridge the gap between their worlds.

A prostitute! There’s for sure gotta be sex in it, then. He checked the rating. Rated R for Sexuality and Some Language. Cool!

Alright, mission accomplished. He took out his library card, but, glancing at the elderly librarian sitting at the desk, was gripped by sudden worry that she might question his choice in video rental. He looked back at the card, his name signed neatly on the back. It’s the library, the video is free. He’d basically paid for it with his taxes anyway. He slipped the tape into his jacket pocket. It would be okay as long as he brought it back in a couple of days. 

That night, Yakko popped Pretty Woman into the VCR. At the sound of the TV turning on, calamity arose from the other room.  
“What are you watching?”  
“I wanna watch TV too!”  
“Nothing!” He shouted back frantically, shoving the plastic case under the blanket. “It’s boring, you wouldn’t like it! It’s golf! It’s the news!”  
A pause.  
“It’s the news about golf,” he explained. No response, then he heard his siblings change the topic. Nice. He got up and closed the door, then locked it as quietly as he could.

He climbed back onto the couch eagerly and started the movie. But after about ten minutes, all he’d seen was a bunch of old men in suits talking to each other. He picked up the remote and fast forwarded it. Julia Roberts was getting into Richard Gere’s car. He hit play.

They were talking about how manual transmission works. Come on. He fast forwarded it again. They were walking into a hotel room. Play.

Richard Gere offered Julia Roberts strawberries, telling her that they bring out the flavor in the champagne she was drinking.  
“I appreciate this little seduction thing you’ve got going, but let me give you a little tip. I’m a sure thing,” she said.

So would he be expected to lavish her with expensive presents if she wasn’t? Could gifts turn someone into a sure thing? Strawberries and champagne seemed like very appropriate gifts to seduce someone with, but he had a hard time coming up with any other examples. What would Hello Nurse like? He made a mental note to brainstorm ideas later.

The scene changed. Gere and Roberts were watching I Love Lucy, just sitting around and talking. Yakko was starting to think that he had a misconception about what prostitutes actually were, but then she turned to Gere and they shared a long look. Without him even having to say anything, she miraculously began crawling over to him on all fours like a caged lion. She slid one hand up his pants leg playfully. He was still watching the show, with hardly a glance back at Roberts. What was the matter with him? It was like he didn’t even-

Oh! Julia Roberts was taking her shirt off. Yakko leaned forward on the couch, squinting at the low resolution of the TV. She was wearing a purple satin bra, trimmed with black lace. Oh, wow. Her necklaces dipped into her cleavage, but he barely had time to absorb that before she pulled off her skirt, too. Her underwear matched, satin with black lace. One bra strap slid off of her shoulder. Yakko paused it to look at her for a moment, heart beating hard, then pressed play again.  
Roberts leaned forward, stroking Gere’s face, but then got up. Huh? She came back a second later with a towel and spread it on the floor. Why? She kneeled on it between Gere’s legs, hands spreading his knees apart, and muted I Love Lucy.  
She began fiddling with his necktie and unbuttoning his shirt. He was toying with her hair. She pulled his legs forward, causing him to slide farther down on the couch. Yakko mimicked the movement. She unzipped Gere’s pants. 

“What do you want?” Roberts asked.  
“What do you do?” said Gere.  
“Everything,” she replied, “but I don’t kiss on the mouth.”

Everything? What did that mean? Yakko could only think of one or two things.  
Roberts smiled at Gere and began kissing his bare chest. She slowly moved her lips down his torso. She looked up, her kneeling on the floor between his legs and him sitting on the hotel sofa, then brought her head down to his lap, and the camera cut to his face. He inhaled, closing his eyes. Then the scene changed to him showering. 

Wait, what happened?

Yakko rewinded the film by about thirty seconds. There she was, kissing his chest, then his stomach, then she moved her head down, still kissing, and-

Ohhhhh! Oh wow, okay, so she’s- hmm.

He rewatched the scene again, and then again, and then again, breathing heavily. His dick was standing up at full attention against his zipper. He turned off the TV and locked himself in the bathroom.

He saw Hello Nurse again the very next day, when Dr. Scratchnsniff called her into their session to bring him his stupid little puppet. As she handed it to him, Yakko watched her red, full lips moving. He thought about what he had seen Julia Roberts do in Pretty Woman. Had she ever done that? 

He felt his heart begin to race as he realized that it was extremely likely that she had. He looked at her figure across the room and imagined her laying a towel out on the ground in front of him, getting on her knees, and spreading his legs wide apart with both hands. He struggled to breathe. He looked down, imagining her there saying, “What do you want?” in her captivating voice. 

Then she would unzip his pants. He inhaled sharply and closed his eyes like Richard Gere. In his mind, she brought her scarlet lips down onto him, taking him into her hot, wet mouth, blue eyes gazing up at him. She extended her pink tongue and licked him tauntingly.  


He gasped and opened his eyes, realizing with horror that he was fully erect in the middle of the group session with one, two, three, four other people present. He crossed his legs. Think about baseball. He glanced around quickly. No one seemed to be looking at him.  
Hello Nurse turned to leave, and he felt his composure crack a little at the seams. Her eyes danced up and down his body, and she gave him a knowing smirk before she swayed out the door.

Fuck, the whole point of his research had been to convince her that he could keep it together. Somehow, though, she had still looked pleased.

A little less than one week until the Christmas party. He had to be better.


	7. Monday Morning

DECEMBER 17TH, SUNDAY EVENING

The slender candle in Heloise’s hand had begun to melt, the white molten wax rolling slowly from the flickering flame down its tapered side, before pooling on the cardboard circle lodged around its middle and solidifying in watery, abstract shapes. The thin barrier prevented the wax from burning her skin, but she curiously outstretched one finger and touched the small river of hot fluid anyway. She gasped and pulled back her finger at the heat, rubbing her thumb over the spot where it burned her, then reached out to poke at it again.

“Heloise, what the actual fuck are you doing?” whispered Sonya, her face illuminated by her own flickering candle. Around the dark hillside, a sea of orange flames danced in unison, swaying in the hands of faithful worshippers as they sang into the night sky.  
Sonya’s parents were devout Christians. Each year they required her to attend Christmas Eve and Christmas Day service, as well as make an appearance at a special candlelit caroling night, always held the Sunday before. Sonya had begged each of their friends to accompany her this year, promising it to be dreadfully boring, and only Heloise had taken pity on her. So far, she wasn’t finding it dreadful or boring at all, on the contrary, there was something peaceful and revitalizing about spending a night singing outdoors in candlelight. The park overlooked the city skyline, and the lights of the buildings twinkled merrily below the looming blue mountains, their peaks capped in snow. Higher up, the stars shone brightly through the clear night sky. The trees over their heads were strung up with lights, and each member of the congregation was dressed in festive, red and green formal wear, bouncing along to Go, Tell It On The Mountain.

As the song ended, the beaming pastor stepped up to the wooden, makeshift stage, arms raised beneath his white robe. “Fear not!” He boomed into the microphone, and the crowd cheered, hands in the air. “For, behold, I bring you good tidings of great joy, which shall be to all people.” He paused dramatically after each word, allowing time for applause. Someone shouted “Amen!” from the mass of onlookers. “For unto you is born this day in the city of David a Savior, who shall be called Christ the Lord.”  
The congregation cheered again, more “Amen”s and “God is Good!”s resonating from the group.  


“Christ is our Lord!” Thunderous applause. He raised both hands again, and walked off the stage as the musicians climbed back on, plunging into an upbeat, twangy melody.  


“Have you been to Jesus for His cleansing power, are you washed in the blood of the Lamb?” sang the group. Heloise did not know the words, but she was enjoying watching the worshippers celebrate. Her eyes skimmed the crowd.

Wait- what the fuck?

“Are you fully trusting in His grace this hour?” 

Deja Thomas?!

Heloise squinted through the darkness, trying to make out Deja’s face behind her wavering candle flame. Why would Deja be here of all places? She hadn’t even seen her in months. Heloise watched her sing out,

“Are your garments spotless, are they white as snow?”

She blinked. No, that wasn’t Deja. Was it? She could barely see her in the dim light, and she kept disappearing behind the jostling worshippers. For a moment, the crowd parted, and she got a better look at the woman’s face.

Even in the midst of this joyful scene, the tall woman exuded authority in an intimidating manner identical to that which Deja carried. The similarities between her and Deja were uncanny, but she was markedly less beautiful, though this could be attributed to her general hawkishness. Where Deja’s features were soft and inviting, this woman’s face was angular and sharp, with a shrewdly pointed nose and chin. No huge black curls bounced atop her head, but her hair was still thick and voluminous, partially obscuring her face in enormous, sweeping bangs, and a dark beauty mark dotted her unsmiling lip. She had the same lovely, smooth mocha skin, and her brown, catlike eyes were a dead ringer for Deja’s, but when she gazed towards Heloise, no spark of recognition ignited in them. As Heloise looked into those strikingly familiar eyes, the woman reached into her blazer pocket and hid them behind purple-framed glasses, extinguishing the resemblance.

“Ladies and gentlemen of the congregation,” the pastor’s voice reverberated again through the speaker system, “Kneel before your King.”

Heloise hesitated uncertainly, watching the crowd, but they all obeyed without pause, sinking down onto the chilly grass. Not wanting to be the odd one out, she followed suit. 

“Our Father who art in Heaven,” began the pastor, and the group bowed their heads. Heloise kept her eyes open, looking at the ground. Curiously, she peeked back up at Not Deja, and was surprised to find that she wasn’t praying with the rest of the congregation, but was instead rudely staring at her wristwatch in calculated exasperation, the only head turned upwards among the ocean of devotees. Other than herself, of course. Heloise looked back down quickly. It wasn’t that strange, she supposed. Here she was, too, and she wasn’t religious. It’s Christmastime, and a lot of people were likely to be attending church services to fulfill obligations or appease family members rather than out of a genuine belief.

“Hey, what were you just staring at?” Sonya whispered.  
“Look at that woman,” Heloise replied. “Doesn’t she look just like Deja?”  
“Who?”  
“The one in the gray pantsuit. With the purple glasses,” Heloise said.  
“No, I mean, Deja who?”  
“What? Deja Thomas. Well, actually, I don’t know if that’s really her last name.” She’d used a credit card under Thomas that one time, but, to be fair, it was Deja, and Heloise hadn’t seen the card herself.  
“Deja, who then?” Sonya asked.  
“How do you not remember Deja? We all went to the diner together. She was hungover. You slept with her or something after you met her at a club. I almost did too.”

Sonya paused, confused. Was Heloise being gaslighted?

“When was this?”  
“Summer.”  
“Summer! Why would I still remember that?” Sonya replied.

The crowd got to their feet as the prayer ended. Sonya smacked her arm into Heloise’s ribcage, knocking the wind out of her and causing her to nearly light herself on fire as her candle wobbled. “Oh, you mean that business lady?! Yeah, yeah, I remember Deja now. And damn, she really does look like her. Like, a weird amount. They could even be sisters.” She squinted. “Do you think she’s also into girls?” 

Heloise couldn’t make Not Deja out in the crowd, and had in truth already begun forgetting what she looked like.  


“What?”  


“I said, do you think lesbianism runs in their family? She’s still pretty hot, even though she’s kind of scary look-” An elderly couple in front of Sonya turned to give her an offended glare. Heloise and Sonya mumbled apologies and looked down at their candles piously.  
The pastor began dismissing the congregation, and the churchgoers started turning to one another to make small talk.  
“What even happened to Deja?” Heloise asked in her normal volume.  
“I think she moved to Vegas or something,” said Sonya.

At those words, a weight lifted from Heloise’s chest, relieved to hear that this threat was removed from her life. Deja was extraordinarily intelligent, and Heloise had feared that she had begun putting the puzzle pieces together. She had more than enough to go off of to figure it out, and absolutely no reason to keep her mouth shut, either. She was commanding, charismatic, and perceptive, and had the gift of natural influence over others. Thank God these powers were in the hands of a perpetually drunk party girl, Heloise thought. Anyone else and we’d all be fucked. 

“Girls! There you are,” beamed Sonya’s mother, arm in arm with her husband, both in red snowflake-patterned sweaters. “Thank you for coming with us tonight, Heloise. Would you like to stop by to warm up in front of the fire before you head home?”

The eggnog was rich, creamy, and strong, and after just two glasses, Heloise felt fuzzy and vague inside, sitting on the floor in front of the crackling fireplace. The warmth from the flames hugged her like a blanket, the smell of the smoke pleasantly seeping into her clothes. She took a deep sip of the buttery, thick drink and let the alcohol burn her throat on the way down. She wiped the white eggnog mustache from above her lip with one finger, which she looked at before licking clean.  
“Slurp, slurp, Heloise,” crooned Sonya, smacking her lips clownishly in imitation. Her parents gave her a look.  
“We just got home from church,” her father reprimanded disapprovingly.  
“It was a lovely service,” said Heloise. “Thank you for inviting me.” I’m so good at manners, she thought to herself foggily. She was feeling very cozy.

“Would you like to spend the night here?” asked Sonya’s mother. “We have a pullout couch in Sonya’s old bedroom. You girls could have a sleepover, like you did when you were little.”  
“No thank you, Mrs. Montoya,” Heloise replied. “I don’t have any of my things. And besides, tomorrow’s Monday. I should be getting home.”

An ember burned sinfully inside her at the reminder that she had work tomorrow. Work had gotten fun again. She knew she shouldn’t be having these thoughts, but she didn’t care anymore, and especially not tonight, not right now, with the eggnog clouding her mind and her temperature rising at the memory of Friday. They’d only been in the same room with one another for a couple of moments. In fact, they hadn’t even spoken at all that day, and yet she’d seen him nervously trying to hide his massive erection, all flushed and aching for her after only a minute or two in her presence. In front of everyone, no less, and she could see the wretched embarrassment in his eyes, but he wanted her so badly it was incapacitating.  
She knew he was ashamed of his body’s response to her proximity, but it only turned her on more to watch him struggle to conceal it. She sipped her drink again, feeling her own cheeks heat. It was so fun to torture him, but in doing so she’d started to torture herself. Maybe admitting to it in the delirium of the argument had been ill-advised, but she’d accepted it a long time ago: she did want him to fuck her very badly. Even if wanting him to fuck her badly ended up just being him, fucking her, badly. If it lasted less than a minute, witnessing his undoing would still be just as satisfying as a good, hard screw. Their little game had reached boiling point, bound at any moment to bubble over.  
Thoughtfully, she brushed the scars on her cheekbone, now completely faded. She looked at her hand and gently squeezed the flesh of her fingertip, thinking about a cat’s retractable claws, sliding out with applied pressure. 

She hadn’t known about the fangs. She hadn’t known about the claws…

Sonya and her parents were chatting in front of her, draped comfortably in armchairs around the fire, acoustic Christmas hymns drifting through the air from the radio. Heloise tuned back in for a second to make sure she wasn’t missing anything, but it seemed that Sonya’s father was just pestering her about her career. Heloise got up and poured herself a third glass of eggnog.  
“Alright,” she said, raising it up for the room to see. “This is the last one, and then I’m gonna go catch the bus.”  
Sonya’s mother rushed to her side. “No, Heloise, no! We’ll drive you home. Don’t worry about that, dear.”  
“Thanks, Mrs. Montoya,” said Heloise, and was immediately wrapped in an affectionate hug, perhaps not the only one feeling a little bit tipsy. As Sonya’s mother returned to her husband’s lecture, Heloise pulled a chair out from the table and dropped into it, glass in hand.

She hadn’t known about the claws, but she definitely did now. 

After that difficult night, she’d taken the next day off of work, allowing herself twenty-four hours of emotional turmoil before she pulled her shit together. She’d come to the heartbreaking decision that she did the right thing, and that doing the right thing doesn’t always feel good. Then she’d spent the next four days telling everyone who asked about her wound that she’d tried to bathe her new kitten. Each time the lie left her lips, it hurt more.  
She was certain, looking back, that she had never reached a point where she truly believed she was going to quit this addiction cold turkey. It felt moreso as though making an attempt was a rite of passage that she must complete in order to be able to live with herself. Even now, she couldn’t begin to justify her behavior, but she could feel the lustful tremors quieting her guilty conscience, dampening it from a roar, to a hum, to nothingness, looking for any feeble excuse to continue its parasitic possession of her, and she was its willing slave.

Five days after the attack, she’d had one spoonful of soup when Dot Warner spotted her across the cafeteria. She tried to pack everything up and get away as fast as she could, but it turned out that it was hard to run with soup. Cornered, she had placed her tray down in defeat, frightened nearly for her life. What do you want, she’d thought to herself, an ‘I’m sorry that I tried to not fuck your brother’? It crossed her mind in that moment that Dot didn’t actually know the full extent of what was going on, not really.  
Instead of tearing her to bloody shreds, Dot apologized to her, albeit in the most stilted and agonized way possible.  
“I promise I won’t try to kill you again,” she had said. “Unless you deserve it.”  
Heloise was not comforted by this, but she saw the sincerity in Dot’s face. Maybe she didn’t know what had truly happened, but she knew that what she did upset people she cared about, and that was enough for her to put aside her ego. Heloise felt oddly proud of her.

“Dot,” she’d said. “Thank you for apologizing. I owe you an apology, too. I never meant to hurt either one of you.”  
Dot sighed uncomfortably, looking around like she was waiting to leave the conversation. “It’s okay, I bet you didn’t even do anything. He’s just kind of like that about you.”  
Heloise tried to look nonchalant, but her skin tingled at this information. “I’m not sure what you mean, Dot,” she said innocently.  
“Oh well, you know,” Dot sounded irritated.  
Heloise shook her head.  
“Well, he obviously has a huge crush on you.”  
This was common knowledge. “But he’s like that with a lot of girls, right?”  
“You’re different, though,” said Dot.  
Heloise didn’t know what to say.  
“He talks about you literally all the time, to everyone, it’s just like, Hello Nurse this, Hello Nurse that, like anyone cares,” she paused, “Um, no offense.”  
She tried not to blush.  
“And- and he has a gross poster of you on the wall, which I’m forced to look at every day. Barf. Um, no offense?” She winced, then plowed on nonsensically. “And he sits around trying to draw pictures of you, and writing things down that he’s gonna say to you like a huge dork, oh, and ever since I made him come back to the group sessions he’s just been all annoying and dumb about it, like it’s our fault he was being a total flake. As if it’s okay of him to ditch us constantly to go play smoochy smoochy with-” She looked at Heloise. “No offense. And he’s just a big crybaby anyway, he locks himself in his room every day and I think it’s because he loves to cry and cry all the time. I know this because all week long he’s just been lying on the couch in his nasty PJs and crying like a baby. Get a grip, right? Boys.” She waited patiently for agreement.  
“Oh, right, yeah, that’s just how they are,” Heloise said, her thoughts racing. He had a poster of her? How? Was Dot lying? She’d never done any modeling work or anything like that. What did he do, go get one of their staff photos blown up and laminated? That was incredibly creepy, but- she imagined him locking himself in the room to touch himself to the poster- but it was also kind of hot. She bit her lip.  
“So…” Dot paused.  
“So?”  
“So, do you accept my apology, or what,” Dot said.  
“Oh! Yes, Dot, I do,” she beamed, genuinely unable to keep the smile from her face.

“And anyway, we’re the same age,” said Dot.  
“What?”  
“We’re all in our sixties,” she explained, like that should be obvious.

Heloise struggled to wrap her head around this logic.

“So… does this mean he still wants to be… friends?” She asked lamely, very uncertain how to phrase this in front of Dot.

“Okay, um, good talk,” said Dot, and turned to leave.

“Wait,” said Heloise. Dot hesitated.

Heloise twirled her hair around one finger. “You said he talks about me all the time… what- what does he say?”

Dot gave her a revolted look and walked away.

Someone was shaking Heloise. She blinked, and the cozy living room swam back into view.  
“Hey, Heloise, you good?” asked Sonya. “Almost fell asleep there on us.”  
Heloise smiled at her friend.  
“Yeah, I’m okay. Seriously, though, it’s late. I should get going.”  
“Thank you for visiting us, Heloise. You’re welcome back any time you want,” said Mrs. Montoya. “Marco, honey, would you please drive her home?”  
He gave her a look from the depths of his armchair.  
“Well I can’t, I’ve had a little too much eggnog,” she insisted.  
He sighed and got to his feet, groaning when he put pressure on his knees as if to demonstrate what a hassle this was going to be for him.  
“I can take the bus,” said Heloise. “Really, I don’t mind.”  
“Darling,” Sonya’s mother raised a hand. “I mind.”

DECEMBER 18TH, MONDAY MORNING

As soon as Heloise walked into work the next morning, she knew that something was going on. As she swung open the door, coffee in hand, the clamor of what seemed to have been a very tense conversation abruptly halted and three faces turned to look at her.  
Standing in the center of the room, already frazzled and exhausted at 9:00 in the morning, were Dr. Scratchnsniff, Thaddeus Plotz, and an elderly woman that Heloise had never seen before.  
“Ah, Miss Nerz, zere you are,” said Dr. Scratchnsniff apprehensively.

Panic spiked through her body as she carefully placed her coffee cup down on her desk, where for some reason a plastic bin of fresh red strawberries sat waiting for her. She allowed herself several deep breaths before carefully smoothing her expression back into one of collected professionalism, then turned back around to look at the group.

“It’s about Yakko,” continued Dr. Scratchnsniff.  
Heloise assumed it must be.

“It’s about you,” said the elderly woman angrily. “This is your responsibility. I was told that you were the ones to talk to about this.”  
“Oh! I am sorry,” Dr. Scratchnsniff started, uncharacteristically angry, yet still polite, “But who told you zis? Ve are only psychiatrists.”  
“He did!” The woman pointed at Plotz, who nervously adjusted his tie and gave them a jittery smile.  
“Well, it’s not my fault!” He said. “Don’t look at me!”

Oh, Jesus, what is it this time, thought Heloise, relaxing ever so slightly as she realized that this was unlikely to be in reference to her own degeneracy.

“I don’t care whose fault it is!” shrieked the woman. “All I’ve gotten since I came here was the runaround from each and every single one of you. This is completely unacceptable.” She pulled a VHS tape out of her bag. “You need to watch this.” The makeshift label was nothing but peeling masking tape, words scrawled on it in ballpoint pen. Dr. Scratchnsniff sighed and rolled the wheeled TV out from the corner. He plugged it into the wall, and the woman inserted the tape into the VCR. As her finger hovered over the power button, there came a knock at the door.

“That’s them,” said Plotz weakly. “Are you sure you need me to be here?”

The woman reached for the door. At the sight of the awkward assembly in the room, Dot gasped excitedly.

“We’re having a party?” 

She ran inside, Wakko following her, jumping up to try to turn on the TV. “Ooh, what are we watching?” he asked.

Yakko hung back at the door, his eyes fixed on the elderly woman in front of him, the gears visibly turning in his head.

“Sit down!” Ordered Plotz. “I hope you’re happy that we all have to take time out of our busy morning to deal with this.”

After a long struggle that only furthered the agitation of everyone in the room, all three Warners were placed at the table, and the woman glared at Plotz, waiting for him to begin.

“Is it too much to ask,” he growled, “For you not to engage in complete delinquency for one day?” He slammed his fists on the table. “Oh, I expect you to spend all of your time finding ways to destroy my career and my livelihood. But committing crimes?” He threw his arms up into the air. “Breaking the law? You make us all look bad, and now I have people pounding down my door, asking me to take responsibility for your criminal behavior! May I remind you that your name is attached to our brand?!” 

He rubbed his temples, then hid his face in his hands. “Oh, it’s just going to get worse, isn’t it,” he moaned hopelessly. “This is just the beginning. They grow up to be felons. I should’ve seen it coming.”

“Hey, TP, can I say something?” interrupted Yakko. Throughout the room, faces turned to him violently, daring him to speak. Plotz looked at him through his fingers. Yakko seemed to take this as a green light. “What are you talking about?” 

The elderly woman marched over to where he was seated. “You! Stole! From! The! Library!” She snapped. “Who would do such a thing?! People rely on the public library for free information! They pay for it out of pocket with their American tax dollars! You are stealing from the American people!”

Dot and Wakko looked up at Yakko, pained.  
“You didn’t tell us you were gonna steal from the library,” whined Dot. “Why didn’t you bring us with you?”  
“I wanna steal from the library, too,” Wakko complained.

Yakko held up both hands. “No, I didn’t,” he said.  
“Yes, you did!” Insisted the woman.  
“No, I didn’t,” he smiled back at her.

Heloise popped a strawberry into her mouth. She hadn’t eaten breakfast yet this morning.  


“Yes, you did! We have you on tape!” Shouted the woman, who Heloise presumed to be a librarian, storming over to the television to turn it on. She paused in front of Heloise, then turned to Dr. Scratchnsniff.  
“Doctor, would you please ask your Party City assistant here to kindly refrain from having a little snack right now?” Heloise stopped chewing, the fruit still caught between her teeth.  
Dr. Scratchnsniff looked uncomfortable with this request.  
“She’s right,” said Yakko, looking at her for the first time since their arrival. “You should be having a full meal right now. Which is why I also brought you this.” He placed a bag of three blueberry waffles onto the table. The syrup within the plastic bag was leaking slightly from the corners and already beginning to collect messily on the tabletop. “They might be kind of squished, but I just made them this morning.” He beamed with the pride of an accomplished chef, despite the fact that they suspiciously resembled cheap, circular toaster waffles of the Eggo variety.  
“There were waffles?!” Wakko cried, betrayed to the highest degree.  
“No,” said Yakko, pushing him away. “There are waffles. But they’re for her.”

Wakko grabbed at the bag as Yakko struggled to restrain him.  
“Come on, be cool,” he said threateningly, his voice cracking.

With two pinched fingers, the librarian grabbed the sticky bag from the table and threw it into the garbage. It hit the metal side of the can with a slap. “No eating! No waffles!” She shouted. “Watch the tape!” She flicked the television on.

Heloise looked morosely at the trash can. Why would you just throw away a perfectly good bag of waffles like that? Wait, he said ‘also’. Did he get her the strawberries, too? She glanced back at the tub of fruit thoughtfully as the librarian dragged Wakko flailing out of the garbage can, his mouth full of waffle and plastic shreds. Maybe I can eat another strawberry when they’re all watching the video. She rested her hand casually next to the tub.

“Everyone pay attention!” The woman turned out the lights for a better view of the TV screen, but it made barely any difference, as the sunshine streaming in through the windows still cast the room in bright morning light.

The librarian fast forwarded the CCTV recording, and monochromatic, blue, overexposed shapes flitted through the grainy video section of the library, rifling through bins and pulling out tapes. She paused it suddenly. The time stamp at the bottom read THURS 14 DEC 1994 15:23 CAM 1.  
“There,” she said, pointing to a white blur at the bottom left. Collectively, the group squinted at the fuzzy screen, straining to make out the shape. The librarian sighed, unpaused it, let the tape roll for another second or so, and stopped it again. “There! Do you see?”  
It was undeniably Yakko, although he was wearing some kind of ridiculous disguise. Heloise, along with, she assumed, everyone else in the room, wondered why he would wear a disguise if his intention was not to steal something. The heads in the room turned to look at him and then back to the screen.

“Yes, yes, we can all see that it’s him, just move it along,” Plotz said impatiently, tapping his fingers against the windowsill.

She unpaused the tape. Yakko drifted over to the rack of bins marked “Popular/Contemporary” and began rummaging through the videos, skimming the descriptions on the backs and replacing them as if looking for something specific. Finally, he seemed to find what he was looking for. After reading the summary, his head shot up and he glanced around, his arm outstretched stiffly to one side. He examined it again, turning the tape over in his hands, and stared at the cover. He took a couple steps away from the camera with the tape in hand, but then stopped, looked around, and slid it into his pocket. Then he walked offscreen.  
The librarian rewinded and stopped the video at the moment of theft. She turned the lights back on.

“Well?” She said, arms crossed.  
“Well, what?” Asked Yakko.

“Well, why’d you steal from the library?” Demanded Plotz, his voice raised.  
“I didn’t,” he said.

“Everyone saw you!” Shouted Plotz, gripping the sides of his head like a madman and gesturing wildly to the paused video. “It’s right there on the TV screen! What do you mean, you didn’t? Why would you say that?!”

“Because you can’t steal from the library,” explained Yakko. “Everything is free.”

The room erupted in utter chaos. The librarian was shrieking, “Yes you can! Yes you can!” and Plotz was burying his face in his hands.  
Dr. Scratchnsniff carefully considered, before saying, “Actually, he might be right,” which caused the librarian to begin shaking him violently.  
Heloise laughed out loud and continued eating her strawberries. Yakko caught her eye and waved at her. She waved back.

“Enough!” The librarian screamed psychotically at Yakko, gripping both sides of the table. “You can steal from the library! You can steal from the library!!”

“Oh, thank you,” said Yakko.

The woman looked as though she were about to have a stroke. 

“Can they steal, too, or is it just me?” He asked, gesturing to Dot and Wakko, who smiled at her charmingly.  
“We want to steal,” Dot chirped.

Dr. Scratchnsniff stepped between them and said nervously, “Let’s everybody calm down now, ya? I zink zis is a misunderstanding. Yakko, tell us, vere you going to bring it back?”

“Well, I was,” Yakko huffed, putting a lot of emphasis on the word ‘was’. “But now I’m not so sure. I don’t like the way they treat their guests in that establishment.” He stuck his nose in the air haughtily.

Dr. Scatchnsniff walked back to his desk, shrugging apathetically. The librarian looked at each of them, one by one, in growing rage, waiting for someone to do something about the situation.

The Warners were whispering to one another. Dot raised her hand. “Can we get a sidebar?” She asked.

“Very vell, you may have a sidebar,” said Dr. Scratchnsniff. He looked at the others. “Zey have to talk about it,” he clarified.

Simultaneously, both groups huddled on opposite sides of the room and began speaking in lowered voices.

“What were you thinking?” whispered Dot angrily. “A computer would’ve been so much more valuable. Next time that’s what we’re taking.”  
“What? We’re not going to steal computers from the library,” said Yakko. 

“I thought you said it was okay to steal things from the library,” Wakko said.

“It’s only okay to steal some things from the library,” Yakko elaborated.  
“Like what?”  
“Like books and movies. But only if you bring them back.”

“That’s not even stealing,” Dot complained, “That’s just how the library always works.”  
“That’s what I’m trying to tell these people!”  
“What about tables and chairs,” asked Wakko. “Is it okay to steal tables and chairs if we bring them back?”

Yakko thought about it. “I guess,” he said. “I was going to bring the tape back tonight. I just need to go get it out of the VCR.”

Wakko sucked in a breath, teeth clenched. “VCR’s busted,” he said.

Dot and Yakko looked at him.

“There’s a sandwich in it,” he explained.

Meanwhile, a punishment was being decided upon.

“Make him work for us to pay off the price of the tape,” said the librarian.  
“I… really don’t zink zaht vill be to your benefit,” Dr. Scratchnsniff said carefully.  
“Wouldn’t that only be like, tw- th- four hours worth of work?” asked Plotz, looking pained as he attempted to do math in his head. 

“Let me talk to him,” said Heloise. Three pairs of eyes turned towards her. “He listens to me.”  
“I wonder why that is,” the librarian said sarcastically.

Both groups peeked over their shoulders at one another. Everyone seemed to have finished discussing their next course of action.

“Yakko,” Dr. Scratchsniff said. “Miss Nerz vould like to have a vord vith you.”

“I’d like to have a word with her, too,” Yakko grinned. The librarian rolled her eyes. 

Heloise opened the door. “Come with me, please, Mr. Warner,” she requested in her most professional voice.

As soon as they stepped out into the hall, she closed the door of the office.

“So, what’d you take?” she asked excitedly.  
“Pretty Woman,” he answered.  
“The Julia Roberts movie?” She was confused. She couldn’t imagine him wanting to watch a cheesy rom-com, let alone going out of his way to steal it. “Why?”  
“I wanted to learn more about sex,” he said matter-of-factly.

Heloise jumped and glanced up and down the hallway, alarmed. No one in sight. She dragged him over to the nearby janitorial closet, threw him inside, and shut the door behind them.

The dingy closet was crowded with stacks of sealed boxes and rows of shelves reaching up to the ceiling, piled high with cleaning supplies. In one corner was a rusty sink, and in the other was a mop bucket and soap station. The only light came from a dim, naked bulb overhead with a pull string, casting the clutter in a pale yellow glow as it emitted a low buzzing noise. There was barely enough room for one person to stand comfortably, and Heloise and Yakko had to press themselves against the shelving on either side, legs entangled, in order to continue the conversation.

“Why would you try to learn about sex from Pretty Woman, of all things?”  
“They wouldn’t let me rent porn,” he said.

Heloise laughed at that mental image.

He seemed to mistake her amusement for something else. The swaggering defiance he’d displayed in the office dropped, and he stared woefully at the dusty cement floor. “I just didn’t…”

He looked at her. “I just didn’t want to be a disappointment to you,” he admitted.

Heloise was touched by his honesty. “You’re not going to disappoint me,” she said.

Her use of the future tense felt like a promise, and the buzz of the lightbulb grew loud and intrusive as they looked at one another in shared surprise. 

The space between them was enormous in its smallness.

She cleared her throat. “So, did you learn anything from Pretty Woman?”  
“I learned how manual transmission works,” he said.

“How does it work?” asked Heloise.  
“I don’t know,” he replied.

The space between them was deafening. It was all she could hear.

“There was- there was one scene,” he said. “I’ve been thinking about it a lot.”  
“Which one?”  
“Th- they were…” He tore his eyes away from hers awkwardly, struggling to find anywhere else to look in the tiny, enclosed room. “They were in a hotel room.”

“Doesn’t most of it take place in a hotel?” She could barely remember.  
“I don’t know,” he said again, suddenly blushing. “I didn’t make it any farther than that.”

“What do you mean y-” Comprehension dawned on her. That kind of scene. “Was it the piano one?” She asked. If she remembered any sex scenes from the movie, it would have to be the piano fucking.

“No? It was in the beginning,” he said.  
“I’m not sure I…” She squinted at him, searching through her foggy memories of the movie. In the beginning? “Oh, do you mean the blowjob scene?” 

“The what?”

She gave him a look. Oh, come on. Surely he was just saying that to…

He looked up at her, a dark, lanky figure mere inches away in the tight, cramped closet. Surrounded by clutter, she was close enough to feel the heat radiating from his body. She searched his face and found nothing but genuine curiosity.

She blinked at him. “You… seriously don’t know what that word means?”

“No,” he said sincerely. “What does it mean?”

Well… 

Wellllllllll…….. !

Heloise raised her right hand and lightly touched the hair elastic around her wrist. 

Two roads diverged in a yellowed wood.

It was only nine o’clock in the goddamn morning. They needed to get back soon. They were in a janitorial closet with no lock on the door. She took off her hat and slowly hung it on the mop handle behind her.

And sorry I could not travel both  
And be one traveler  
Long I stood,  
And looked down one as far as I could.

She gathered her blonde hair up with both hands, placing the hair elastic between her teeth. This had started innocently as an unassuming Monday morning.

Both that morning equally lay  
In leaves no step had trodden black.

Hypnotized, Yakko watched her pull her hair into a ponytail reverently, eyes following the white-gold strands as they swished around her head.

Yet knowing how way leads on to way,

Heloise finished tying up her hair, and Yakko regarded her with delicious naïvety, still uncertainly awaiting an answer.

I doubted if I should ever come back.

“You can sit or you can stand,” said Heloise.

Yakko’s eyes widened in stunned understanding. He opened his mouth and then closed it again. Without looking, he stumbled backwards and sat down on a blue milk crate against the wall, knocking several boxes to the floor in the process, as if he thought that if he didn’t obey fast enough she might change her mind. He stared up at her, breathing quickly. 

Heloise placed a hand on his chest. His heart was racing. She moved her hand back up to his face and tilted his chin towards her, then leaned down and slowly kissed him. As she did, he enclosed her in his arms, drawing her closer, and she lowered herself onto her knees as she had last night in the cool grass. Kneel before your King.

He opened his eyes at the movement, and when he saw her kneeling in front of him, both hands on his thighs, he inhaled brokenly, his shoulders shuddering back.

Heloise stroked the sides of his legs. “Are you sure that you’re ready?” She murmured gently. “Is this what you want?”

He nodded shakily.

“Tell me,” she whispered.

“Yes,” he breathed, mesmerized. 

She reached up and kissed him again, more earnestly this time, and he responded enthusiastically, clinging to her back like a life raft, their bodies pressed tightly together. This, their third kiss- fourth, Heloise thought, if she counted their first as being the awkward peck he’d bravely given her back in August- was the most passionate that they had ever shared, and she felt a significant difference in its meaning. The others were born of impulsivity, but this one communicated a message. In this kiss, doubt, hesitation, and wavering angst had washed away without a trace, and in their place she was surprised to find a new connection blossoming like sunshine after a storm. Trust. Forgiveness. Empathy. Attachment? Her mind orbited around the impossible yet undeniable fact that she had come to feel these things about Yakko Warner. It was outlandish, but somehow at once obvious. She realized now that it had always felt like they each played an irreplaceable role in one another’s lives, ingrained permanently in the core of their very beings. So much of who I am is because of him, she realized. And so much of who he is exists because of me.

He moaned needily against her lips, and she was pulled out of her reverie to remember that she had decided to suck dick at 9 AM on a Monday morning. 

She pulled away and looked at his face, flushed and clouded with arousal, his eyelids heavy as he gazed at her, smitten. She watched his lips part as she unfastened the first four buttons of her uniform, and it fell loosely from her shoulders. Then she wrapped her arms around his waist, pressing her breasts against him. Frantically, he squeezed her through her bra, grabbing hungrily at her cleavage. Surely he couldn’t feel anything through all these layers of fabric?

She reached for the hem of his left glove, intending to slide it off of his hand, but he quickly jerked his wrist away from her as though she’d burned him, distress in his eyes. She waited for an explanation, but he merely stared at her, fearful.

“Yakko, what’s going on?” she said. “Do you not want to touch me?”  
He looked very upset by this question. “Yes, I do! Of- of course I do,” he mumbled, lowering his eyes. “That’s all I want.”  
“Is there a reason why you don’t want to take off your gloves?” She asked him quietly. “It’s okay, you can tell me.”  
He turned his face away, mortified. “Sometimes-” he stopped.  
Heloise waited patiently for him to continue.  
“Sometimes th-they come out,” he stammered. “If I get too… uh, excited. My claws,” he added, looking away.  
Heloise was fascinated. “Is that normal?” She instantly regretted her choice of words.  
His face fell, ashamed. “I… don’t know,” he said miserably. “It just started happening… a few years ago.” He was blushing, curling his hands tightly into fists as if to hide his fingertips.

“Are they out… right now?” Heloise asked.  
He blinked at the ceiling rapidly.  
“Yes,” he said.

Heloise, sensing his embarrassment, reached out to place her hands on his reassuringly. “I don’t mi-” He yanked his wrists back again, out of her reach.  
“I don’t want to hurt you,” he insisted, eyes fixed on the newly healed side of her face. “Don’t take them off.”  
“I’m not afraid,” said Heloise. “I know you can be gentle.”  
He looked at her sadly. “No,” he whispered. “I don’t know if I can be.”

They were silent for a moment in the cramped, dimly lit closet.

“Yakko, you don’t have to take your gloves off if you don’t want to,” she said. “You don’t have to do anything that you don’t want to do. It doesn’t matter what the reason is.” She outstretched her hands, palms up, this time waiting for him to take hers. After a brief pause, he did. She gently massaged his knuckles, looking into his eyes. Steadily, the anxiety faded from his face. He nodded.

She squeezed his hands one last time. “Do you want to keep going?” She asked. He nodded again, enthusiastically.

From her position between his legs, Heloise craned her body upwards and kissed his forehead gently. He leaned into it welcomingly. Then she kissed the side of his face, tilting his head lightly to the left. She brought her lips to his chin and trailed down his neck, and at the sensation of her breath on his throat, he leaned back, gasping. She continued to his chest, feeling his pulsing heartbeat, and then his flat, firm stomach, wondering vaguely to herself if getting fur in her mouth was going to be an issue. She paused above his lap, and he looked back down at her with round eyes, cheeks heated. She gazed at him as she unbuckled his belt, then unfastened the top button, and then finally pulled down the zipper. She gripped the waistband of the heavy material and slowly slipped his pants down around his hipbones. Immediately, his erect cock sprang up in front of her face from its fabric prison. It was her turn to gasp, face flushing.

She didn’t know what she had been expecting, but she hadn’t imagined this. Around the base, the shape was humanoid, although covered in black fur, along with his testicles. Here his fur was much bushier and thicker than elsewhere on his body, similar to the tousled, lush tufts on his head and chest, though far more shaggy and coarse. Emerging from this dense black thicket of fur was a thick, red, ringlike swelling, sloping into a long, protruding shaft, rosy and hairless, extending almost to the height of her entire face. As she drew her gaze slowly up to its ridged, slanted head, a hot trickle of precum slid from the swollen tip down the red, stiff length, already leaking impatiently down into his fur below.

He was watching her carefully.  
“Sorry,” she breathed. “It’s just, um, you’re- you’re… different.”  
His face melted into a flattered smile, as if she’d said something very romantic. It occurred to her that he may not realize she had meant physically. She didn’t bother to clarify, still staring at the bestial, startlingly large penis in front of her. 

She felt as though her skin was on fire, aware of each second that she hesitated. Surely… this works the same way? Experimentally, she reached out with one thumb and wiped the trail of hot fluid from the wet tip, and his rigid dick jolted at her touch. He emitted a perverse, thrilled whine. 

Okay, that’s what she thought. Confidence restored, she wrapped her lips around his cock as far down as she could go, pressing her tongue against its salty thickness, but as soon as her mouth enveloped him, it suddenly expanded, pushing farther out from its black sheath and hitting her against the back of the throat. She choked, surprised, reflexive tears coming to her eyes. Okay, okay, you can work with this. 

She curled her right hand around the base, cupped his balls with her other hand, and raised her mouth up to the tip, sucking her cheeks in. She lapped her tongue around the sensitive head, and another gush of hot precum leaked out into her mouth. She licked it up thirstily and looked up at him as she smacked the clear fluid between her lips. His mouth was open and his eyebrows creased pleadingly as he panted, grasping at the crate. She sank her head back down to the base, keeping her eyes fixed on his. His eyelids fluttered.

She reached for his hand and placed it on the back of her head. He tangled his fingers into her hair, but didn’t push at her as she resumed. Using one hand to stroke him, she licked his cock up its full length, teasing at the seeping tip, and he moaned loudly. She swirled her tongue downwards and sucked his balls into her mouth, at the same time slowly rubbing his dick from top to bottom, using the already plentiful mixture of precum and saliva as lubricant. His moan increased in volume to an urgent cry. 

She released him from her mouth. “Yakko, you need to shut the fuck up.”

“Ahhhh! I! Mnn-” His speech was incoherent and still dangerously loud. She pressed her left hand over his mouth, silencing him.

“That’s better, Mr. Warner,” she purred. “I’m gonna keep my hand here until you can show me that you’ve learned how to be quiet like a good boy.” He rolled his head back like a spoiled brat, still vocalizing disobediently against her restraining fingers.

She gave him another warning look and then sealed her lips back around his dick. She launched into a faster rhythm, variating between bobbing her head up and down and pausing to flick her tongue over his tip while milking him with her fist. He continued attempting to speak against her hand, and she could feel the vibrations of his disjointed sounds on her skin.

She noticed that he had begun rutting his hips up, instinctively thrusting against her lips rather than sitting still and letting her do the work. That’s fine, he can take the lead if he wants, she decided. Why not let him try it out, see what he does.

She interrupted her work and stood up. He looked up at her in indignation, as if he thought she’d decided to just bring him back to the office now. She gently took his hands and pulled him up from his seat, bringing him over to where she’d been a moment before, and she took his place sitting on the crate, facing him, effectively switching their positions. He looked bewildered, standing in front of her deliriously, his hands still floating in the air where she’d let go of them, with his swollen cock sticking straight out from his undone pants at a ninety-degree angle. In explanation, she tilted her chin up, opening her mouth wide like a sex doll, and dragged his hips forwards, letting go just before he touched her lips. 

He seemed to get the idea. He cradled the back of her head with one hand, supporting himself, and carefully thrust into her mouth. He tipped his head back, eyes closed, satisfied, then pushed into her again, more assuredly this time. His pace was slow and experimental, and she found it easy to keep her eyes fixed upwards towards him, reassuring and encouraging. He looked down at her through his dark eyelashes and sighed devotedly at the sight of her face. 

Then he pulled completely out from her lips. He placed one knee next to her on the crate, braced himself against the wall with one arm, and abruptly rammed all the way into the back of her throat. Her head smacked against the brick wall. She cried out, but found herself muffled as he began pounding into her with a powerful, inhuman vivacity, beating at her tonsils. He leaned farther forward, and she was trapped against the wall firmly, her face mashed against his strong lower abdomen, thick black fur entering her nostrils and eyes. She squeezed her eyelids shut, feeling her goopy mascara run down her face, mingling with her saliva and the salty wetness already smeared across her cheeks. The hand that had been cradling her neck now gripped her hair tightly, pulling her head back, captive, as he fucked her face relentlessly. Giddy, she willfully surrendered to this unexpected domination, arousal running through her veins hot and demanding.  


Unrestrained by her muzzling hand, he had begun making brazen, wild noises with each plunge into her throat. Listening to the sounds of his pleasure, she felt her underwear begin to stick to her skin, dampening. She struggled to hang on to the crate as she tried to grind against it for some relief, but found herself pinned to the wall, no control over her body as the vigorous pace picked up impossibly harder than before, brutal and frenzied as he neared his climax. All she could see in front of her face was blackness, and her eyes rolled upwards into her skull against the surging motion. She could vaguely hear the back of the crate banging loudly against the wall over Yakko’s cries, interlacing with whorish choking sounds. Oh, that’s me.

He let go of her hair to place his other arm against the wall, leaning his forehead against it as he panted heavily, and she took advantage of the freedom to move her hand underneath her skirt, slipping her fingers gratefully into her wet panties. She gave a strangled moan against his cock in satisfaction at the much needed touch, arching her back, her body hot and free, unsure in the swirling eddy where her sticky skin ended and his sweaty fur began.

With only a wordless shout for warning, Yakko came down her throat, the gushing cum spilling over her lips and dribbling down her chin. His hips stuttered in front of her face as he released two more hot pumps of jizz, which she swallowed loyally, the muscles of her throat squeezing against him as his dick finished convulsing in her mouth.

For a moment or so, he didn’t move, breathing hard above her head, before he pulled out, a runny thread clinging to her lips from the red tip of his satiated cock. Then he stumbled backwards and collapsed on the cardboard box across from her, long legs outstretched in exhaustion.

Heloise’s head lolled down against her shoulder, her mind empty and blissful. Her hair was coming out of its ponytail, strands clinging to her forehead raggedly, and in her peripheral vision she could see her eye makeup caked around her warm, flushed cheeks like a raccoon. She could only imagine her lipstick must likewise be smeared across her face.

That was like getting facefucked by some kind of... well, animal. Did he have any idea at all how rough that was?!

It seemed like the answer was no. Slumped bonelessly on the cardboard box, he was gazing at her softly with a drugged-looking smile on his face, adoration in his glazed over eyes as if seeing the face of an angel, despite the fact that she was sure she looked like she’d just been hit by a bus. His face was ruddy and his dick curved over his stomach, leaking final drops of fluid onto his fur. She struggled to piece two coherent thoughts together. 

“Yakko,” she rasped weakly. When she said his name, his whole body straightened up.

“You… almost killed me there,” she mused. He looked horrified. “Not literally. Just… that was very… aggressive.”

“I’m sorry,” he said mournfully, looking down at the floor in shame. 

“No!” She dismissed his apology. “Whatever you do, don’t be sorry.” She struggled to sit up and raised one eyebrow at him. “I loved it.” She swiped her fingertip up through the small river of cum running down her chin, and, without breaking eye contact, popped the finger into her mouth.

He gave her a strange look, and then said, “Does that taste… good?” 

She stared at him, then realized he wasn’t joking. She began laughing deliriously. Her sides hurt. She looked up at his insulted expression and laughed even harder.

“I’m sorry,” she wheezed, wiping her wet face. “That’s just a funny thing to ask someone right after you’ve had your dick sucked.” 

He thought about it and then laughed too. They spent a moment watching each other giggle brainlessly, then fell into silent, disoriented smiles. Heloise got to her feet and leaned over Yakko, grabbing him by the shoulders, then kissed him on the mouth.

“Mm-!” His eyes were wide and alarmed as she deliberately swished her tongue over his.

“Well?” She asked. “Does it taste good?”

He looked like he didn’t know if he should be disgusted or turned on. “I don’t- I don’t know,” he said. “It just tastes… it just tastes.”

“Yeah,” said Heloise.

Then they sat there for another moment.

“Was that my Christmas present?” He asked.

“I thought you wanted Donkey Kong,” she said. He opened his mouth in frustration, but before he could speak, she continued, “I’m just kidding! But seriously, we’re not done here. Not by a mile. I’m going to need you to apply that talent… elsewhere. If you don’t mind, Mr. Warner.”

He smirked at the ground, one eyebrow raised as if sharing a joke only with himself.

"Oh no," she groaned, throwing her arm over her face. "Now you think you're the shit, don't you."

He grinned up at her and shrugged one shoulder roguishly, running his tongue over an exposed fang. Lord. Red-hot desire burned through her again, despite the fact that she had just finished eight minutes of having her brains pounded out through her throat. Eight minutes! Oh, fuck, they’d probably been gone so much longer than that. “We need to get back,” she lamented, rubbing at her eyes.

“I… I think that maybe you should consider washing up first,” he said hesitantly, as they both fastened buttons, voice hushed as if in fear of offending her.  
“Hey! You look awful too,” she protested.

They cracked open the door and peeked down the hallway.  
“I’ll meet you in three,” she whispered, and they headed for opposite bathrooms.

Heloise wobbled in front of the mirror, gazing at her disgraceful reflection. She looked totally fucked. She smiled drunkenly, floating on air, then ran the faucet over her fingers, dabbing the smeared black mascara from beneath her eyes, no thoughts in her head. When she was done rubbing off all of her smudged makeup, her face was pink and puffy, equally as suspicious as before. Damn. If only she had her purse with her, she could brush her hair and fix herself up. She felt around in her pockets- score, she had a tube of lipstick.

She twisted the red lipstick up from its shiny metal casing, then snickered to herself. It looked just like Yakko’s-

Her hand shook, causing the lipstick to fall from her fingertips and clatter into the sink, branding her across the chest with a bright red smear. In the mirror, she stared at her once pristine uniform, tarnished by the vivid mark. She pumped the paper towel roll dispenser and soaked one sheet in cheap liquid soap, but as she sponged at the streak, the stain only grew, spreading like fire up to her shoulder. The scarlet smear was obvious, a discolored blemish on the pure, starched white cotton.  
She smoothed out her collar and let down her long hair, raking her fingers through it and placing it in front of the stain. There. Now no one would even know. 

Except her. She’d know.

The door opened ever so slightly.  
“Hey, you ready?” Yakko whispered from behind it.  
She frowned at the mirror again. This will have to do. 

She stepped out into the hall and they looked at one another. She took a deep breath and pushed open the door of the office, both returning to their seats.

“Well, that took a long time,” said Plotz perplexedly, hands on his hips.  
“I’m sorry, sir,” replied Heloise. “I honestly didn’t think it would.”

Everyone seemed to be waiting expectantly for one of them to speak.

“Well?” demanded the librarian. “What do you have to say for yourself?  
Yakko blinked up at her aimlessly. 

“Huh? Oh,” he said. “Um, stealing from the library is… bad?”

The elderly woman looked impressed.  
“She is very good at vaht she does,” said Dr. Scratchnsniff proudly.  
“Yeah,” hummed Yakko.

Behind the others, Heloise brought a finger to her lips sternly. Shut up. Unswayed by her reprimand, he smiled at her wickedly, head tilted on one hand.

“Well, I think we’re about done here,” said Plotz hopefully. “As long as you get that tape back. Hey, Nerz, that new kitten giving you trouble again?”

What?

She looked down and realized that her clothes were covered in black fur, easy to spot against the white fabric. 

“Oh, yeah, always,” she said hoarsely, trying and failing to wipe it off. “He’s going through a rebellious phase. Likes to play rough.” 

The librarian chuckled. “I’ve been raising three colonies of feral cats,” she said, to no one’s surprise. “Kittens can be a real handful. Careful of those claws, though. They tend not to know their own strength.”


	8. December Twenty-Second

WEDNESDAY, DECEMBER 20TH

Thaddeus Plotz’s secretary removed her headset from atop her tower of moussed-up brown hair, distracted by the door buzzer, and she muted the incessantly ringing telephone, granting a reprieve from its shrill sound bouncing off the gleaming, offensively turquoise walls, but the sudden silence was broken by her echoing footsteps on the reflective floors as she heaved open the enormous door for Hello Nurse.  


“Come in,” called the secretary. “There’s two ahead of you, though. He’s running behind.”  


Those gloriously blue eyes betrayed no hint of emotion as Hello Nurse coolly gazed into the cavernous room to find Yakko Warner already lounging against the left arm of the waiting room couch. In an attempt to exude maturity and professionalism, he was wearing a tawny suit and jacket with a red silk necktie, and he did his best to mimic her nonchalance as he peered at her over the top of last month’s wrinkled old copy of Variety, plucked from the nearby end table.

Hello Nurse paused ever so slightly, then swayed over to the couch and perched herself as far to the right arm as she possibly could, smooth tanned legs crossed. Her skin’s ability to retain a glowing summery bronze long into the dreary winter months, like some sort of ethereal Victoria’s Secret model, was a mystery unsolvable even to Yakko… not that he didn’t plan to search for clues. He turned the newspaper page without reading any of the blurry words and smirked to himself. He hadn’t expected to run into her, but it looked like this was his lucky day. He’d been having a lot of those lately. 

They were there for their year-end reviews, and everyone knows that there’s always the potential to squeeze out a holiday bonus, if you can play your cards right. He’d arrived here with the intention to do exactly that, or rather, he was sent as a representative. It had been unanimously decided by his siblings that he had the highest chance of coaxing a few hundred extra dollars out of Plotz, and all last night was spent rehearsing the hustle in ever more ludicrous roleplay, allowing for any number of unlikely situations. The early hours of the morning were then spent hysterically making lists of what this coveted money will be budgeted towards, with the top contenders, providing he was able to pull off the sweet-talk of a lifetime, including cruises, concerts, and celebrity meetups, the middle tier encompassing swimming pools, blacklights and disco balls, and the least popular options being mundanities like repairs for their many broken appliances, most recently the VCR. Death by sandwich.  
And so he hadn’t slept at all the night before, and had only just had the time to shower and get dressed before making his way to the review, hyped up the whole way by the others. He didn’t need sleep. He was wired, ready to win. The last few days had convinced him beyond a shadow of a doubt that there was nothing he wanted that he couldn’t get, so long as he wanted it hard enough.

“Mr. Plotz’s office, how may I help you today,” sang the secretary in a robotic warble, clacking away on her keyboard at warp speed.

Hello Nurse was staring purposefully out of the massive, floor-to-ceiling window at the glimmering skyscrapers and snowy mountains beyond.  
Burying his face in the worn-out newspaper, Yakko flicked the end of his tail along the seat of the couch, inching uninvited into her space as he studied the article in front of him with false contemplation.  
She kept her stoic, collected demeanor until the tail hovered tauntingly over her thigh, threatening to brush against her skin, at which point she batted it away with the back of her hand without so much as a blink.

Yakko glanced up. The secretary hadn’t noticed.

He turned the page again and snaked his tail back over to her, already shaking with silent laughter. She refused to look. He wrapped it tightly around her wrist and she gasped indignantly, jerking her arm away from him, with a tiny, traitorous smile toying at the corners of her red lips. 

“Is everything okay, Miss Nerz?” Asked the secretary. Yakko looked over at her curiously, as if in alarmed concern for her wellbeing.

“Yes,” she said. “I think I could just use a glass of water.” She stood up to fetch one from the water cooler down the hall.

“Please, allow me,” the secretary insisted. She got up at her desk, and, from the couch, both watched patiently until she closed the door behind her.

Immediately, Yakko slid over to Hello Nurse and nestled an arm around her shoulders. She removed it gingerly.

“Behave, you,” she scolded.

“Or what?” Yakko teased. “You’re gonna teach me a lesson?” He brushed her blonde hair off of her forehead, sneering. “Again?” 

She drew in a breath, but before she could say anything, he dramatically clutched at his chest as if having a heart attack.  
“Oh no!” He cried, sinking to the floor. “I think… I think I feel like… stealing again!!” He stared wildly at his hands in horror, then ran to the secretary’s desk and began tossing office supplies into his pockets. “Can’t… stop… must… steal…!”

Hello Nurse was laughing. “Hey! Cut that out!”

“Oh, no, someone stop him! Not the- not the uhh, staple remover! Someone’s got to do something about this! Isn’t there anyone who’ll throw me into the closet and give me a… strict,” he moaned the word lasciviously, “talking to?”

Then he opened the top drawer of the desk, rummaging through it messily.

“Stop it! Stop!!” Hello Nurse cried. “Mr. Plotz is gonna come in and see you doing that right before your review!”

He looked at the door to Plotz’ office, considering. Then he slammed the drawer shut with his hip, strutted over to the couch and put his arm back around Hello Nurse. With his other hand, he pulled a paperclip out of his pocket and handed it to her chivalrously.

“For you, mademoiselle,” he said, completely butchering the pronunciation. “’Tis but a simple token of my adoration.” 

She didn’t take the paperclip. He placed it in her fingers, then brought her hand up to his mouth and kissed it, making sure to graze her delicate skin with one of his fangs. That always snapped something within her.

“This is unbearable,” she said, but a smile grew across her face.

She was looking into his eyes. His heart thudded. He leaned forward for a kiss, but at that moment the telephone rang, piercing the stillness, and the reckless, lightheaded moment was gone. Both resumed their places on the couch, waiting for the secretary’s return. 

Yakko stared unseeingly at the newspaper with even less interest than before, adrenaline still buzzing through his veins at her continued nearness. He inhaled her tropical perfume, letting it quiet his racing thoughts, always knocking him out fast in one breath like a dose of chloroform. 

“It doesn’t feel real,” he whispered. “I’ve wanted this since the day I met you. But you’ve… always known that, haven’t you?”

She nodded slowly, pulling at her hair.

“So why,” he paused, making sure to ask a question he could handle the answer to, “when did you change your mind?”

She reluctantly looked back at the door before replying uncomfortably, “I… changed it on August seventeenth.”

August seventeenth? What was- oh. Self-consciousness flooded his body at the mortifying memory of the ordeal, and he found himself unable to keep looking at her. 

“That… was that the day that I…” 

She nodded.

Heat rushed to his cheeks. He regretted having said anything, reaching desperately back out for the wave of confidence he’d been riding high on for days. That was- well. It didn’t matter, he’d proved himself, right? She knew that he could… that he wasn’t…

She was gazing back out the sunlit window. Then she bit her lip before continuing, “I always knew that you wanted me. But I didn’t know… that it was like… that.” She let out a faltering breath, silent for a moment. 

“To see you so… overcome. By your, ” she turned to him, an indecipherable expression on her beautiful face, “sexual desire.” 

He blinked at the floor, sure that he had stopped breathing.

“It was not something I’d imagined. That your interest in me was of that nature. Although I suppose the signs were all there…” She trailed off. 

Then, suddenly, she looked at him again, her eyes dancing with the light of a fierce new energy. “It turned me on so much,” she began, and suddenly his lungs regained function, pulling in all the air from the room at once. “To watch you lose control like that. Because of me. I thought about it for days. I wanted to see it again, and again, and again.” 

With each ‘again’, she walked her fingertips higher up his necktie, till she tugged him down by the silk knot. Their faces were only a breath apart as she held him captive in her scarlet nails, head tilted onto her shoulder and her hair cascading down to the leather seat in waves of molten gold. “I can’t seem to get enough,” she purred.

The room was spinning into a colorful kaleidoscope of warmth, her voice the only rope tethering him to the ground, yet at once creating the winding spiral into which he tumbled. She yanked his face closer to hers by the necktie, drawing an uninhibited yelp from his lips. Already, he had begun to grow erect in his dress pants. He shoved the copy of Variety over his lap with both hands.

“Then on Monday,” she said blissfully, her voice sweet and melodic despite her bloodthirsty hold on him, “you showed me that you have so much to give me. And now I want it more than ever. There’s so much I still want from you,” she said, “I’m asking you to give me more… if you can.”

Wild electricity surged through him, and he shifted against the leather clumsily, bound as he was by the neck, hairs standing up on his arms. He squeezed his eyes shut, drinking in her words like life-giving water. To lose… control… wait a minute.

“You’re- you’re doing that to me right now, aren’t you! On purpose!” He accused. He smacked her hand off of his necktie. “I have a meeting in about one minute, you know! You’re trying to make me,” His face flushed harder than ever. “Em- embarrass myself.” 

She grinned at him flirtatiously. “Well of course I am, Mr. Warner,” she crooned in a low voice. “I told you that it turns me on.”

He grabbed both of his ears together with one hand. “It’s too bad I’m not listening to you, then,” he said, shutting out her malevolent siren song. “You won’t get me this time. So, nice try, but it’s not going to wor-”

She snatched the copy of Variety up from his lap. “What were you saying?” She asked innocently. “That it’s not working?”

The door creaked open, and Yakko tackled the newspaper out of her hands.

Across the room, the secretary stopped, surprised, at the sight of the struggle. Yakko spread the paper back out. “I told you, I’m not done reading this,” he said haughtily. “Wait your turn.”

The telephone buzzed, and Plotz’s voice croaked out over the intercom. “Send in the Warner boy,” he sighed. “Let’s get this over with.” 

Yakko stood up, still holding the newspaper in front of himself. “I think I’ll just take this with me,” he announced weakly, to no one. Fuck! It was time for the hustle and everything he’d rehearsed had been wiped clean from his brain. 

The secretary went to open the door for him. Well, at least there was no need to think unsexy thoughts. One look at TP should do it. 

THURSDAY, DECEMBER 21ST

The party was tomorrow night, and for all the talk about it, Heloise still hadn’t actually decided what she was going to buy for the Secret Santa, so it was with great trepidation that she willingly descended into the belly of the beast: the bustling shopping mall four days before Christmas. Deep in the throes of holiday insanity, last-minute shoppers swarmed the parking lot, and as she pushed through the crowd, the sounds of shouting, honking and savagery assaulted her ears from all angles as cars swam in circles like sharks, on the hunt for a parking space.

As she neared the entrance, she noticed a whirlpool of people suctioning off to a surging mass on one side, generating a deafening commotion. Curious, she tiptoed over the heads of the crowd to spot a large, bearded man in black robes standing atop a wooden pallet. He was spitting angrily into a microphone, red in the face, and from the looks of it, the onlookers were jeering back at him.  


As the current of shoppers carried her closer to the door, she could begin to hear the piercing words reverberating from his cheap speaker setup.  


“-Mark of the Beast!” He was screaming. “He who worships the Beast is forever marked, and he will drink from the cup of God’s wrath!”

A religious nut. How lovely, threats of fire and brimstone so close to Christmas. Joy to the world. The man was a far cry from the friendly, beaming pastor of the Montoya’s church, shaking hands and passing along well wishes. The mall evangelist had begun pointing at members of the crowd.

“Repent!” He shrieked. “For the Kingdom of Heaven is at hand! These are the end days!” Oh, of course, a Y2K conspiracist as well. A din of boos and derision rose up from the masses at his words, enraging him further. “Your soul will burn in Hell!” The microphone squealed with ear-piercing feedback. “You will burn!”

Heloise finally made it to the door and gratefully stepped into the chaotic jungle within. Out of the frying pan and into the fire. It occurred to her that she had no idea what she was looking for, so she elbowed her way up to a clearing on the second floor, escaping the surging tide of consumerism.

Okay, so, think. She squinted at the yellowing map in front of her, skimming through the list of stores and food vendors. Anchor Blue, Orange Julius, The Body Shop. It can’t be more than fifteen dollars and it has to be inconspicuous, because everyone else will see it. F.Y.E? RadioShack? It should preferably be something he actually wanted. Well, then, wouldn’t the most obvious answer just be-

A twinkle of red in a storefront window across the funky-patterned bridge pulled her away from her brainstorming. Entranced, she drifted over to the beckoning glimmer. 

Displayed behind the glass was a floor length silk evening gown, scarlet red and entirely strapless, the plunging low sweetheart neckline forming a curved, sexy V-shape above a chiseled, corseted waist. The skirt was tight and form-fitted around the hips and thighs, but swanned into a glamorous princess cut below, blanketing the floor in a shroud of crimson folds. The rich red fabric was dusted with tiny rhinestones, sparkling magnificently in shimmering light from every angle, just enough to catch the eye but conservative enough to keep it classy. Resting atop the canvas mannequin’s head was a velvet Santa hat.  
She still might’ve been able to walk away, if not for the matching purse, thin, red, and elegant, dangling from the crook of the mannequin’s elbow. Oh fuck, that’s the good stuff.  
Before she even knew what she was doing, she pushed open the door to the expensive boutique. The inside was spacious but aggressively minimalistic, covered in black-painted wood paneling, the only furniture in sight a spotless glass table sitting atop a faux fur rug. The whole store smelled like thousand-dollar perfume, and a low drumbeat pulsed hypnotically over hidden speakers.

“I see you have your eye on our Christmas collection,” remarked the young, fashionable saleswoman. “We’ve also got matching shoes for each gown, if you’re interested.”

So, this must be what it’s like to jizz your pants in public. The saleslady saw her expression and plucked the red dress from a hanger, then paused, looking Heloise up and down.

“Judging by your waist, I’d say you were a size four,” she said. “But, forgive me, your chest size… it may have to be tailored to fit correctly. We would be more than happy to provide this service here on site, at an additional charge, of course.”

“There isn’t time,” Heloise replied, surprising herself with her own apparently cemented plans to wear this tomorrow night. But, how could she not? It was so perfect. And after all, she’d just gotten her holiday bonus.

“Of course, ma’am,” the saleslady said. “Just be aware that the neckline may be a little bit small on you.” Fine, fine. Heloise took the dress and shoes from the woman and eagerly drew the embroidered black curtain of the low-lit dressing room.

Her own reflection took her breath away in the illuminated mirror, or maybe it was the tight corset cinching her waist to an impossible hourglass shape, secured at the back in a silk bow. The heavy skirt was sumptuously regal, draping around her in luxurious swathes of scarlet, and she watched the flickering sparkle as she turned, spinning the fabric across the floor. If she could choose an outfit to die in, this would be it.  


The saleslady wasn’t wrong about the strapless top being too small for her, though. Enhanced by the generous boost of the snug fitting corset, the sweetheart neckline decorated her tits more than it did cover them, the full curve of both heavy breasts overflowing out from all sides of the insufficient scarlet cups, exposing what had to be almost a foot and a half long radius of bare, unadulterated double-D titty. She wasn’t sure this could be considered even a remotely tasteful amount of cleavage, let alone suitable for public appearance, unless her goal was to go out and cause traffic accidents. Experimentally, she gave a little jump on the dark wooden floor. Her breasts bounced indecently, but the red fabric still dutifully stayed in place. Okay, so they weren’t going to pop out, but still, is it even acceptable to look like this at a work event?  
Well, this isn’t just an office party, she argued with herself. World-famous directors and actors might be there. 

Yeah, right, because that’s who you’re wearing this for.

She pushed the curtain back aside to get the opinion of the saleslady. When the woman watched her step out, her lips parted, and her eyes slowly travelled up Heloise’s body, from the crimson high heels to her face, then dropped back down to her chest. Her fingers loosened on the shoebox she had been holding and it fell to the floor.  
“I’m- pardon me!” She stammered, struggling to gather everything up off the ground. “Let me just grab this pair of boobs- pair of shoes! Did you- did you, um. Have a question, ma’am?” Her face twitched as she struggled to maintain eye contact.

“No,” said Heloise. “You answered it.”

In one hand Heloise held the precious, gold-stamped bag in which the atomic bomb of a gown rested, swaddled in satiny tissue. In the other swung a significantly cheaper plastic bag. Both contained treasures of equal importance.

As she left the mall, victorious, she once again passed by the crazed evangelist outside. Though the crowd had dispersed, he was still pointing at passerby, shouting, “God will punish you! You will burn in Hell!”  
Heloise rolled her eyes and walked by him, but she was met with no verbal assault regarding her soul’s eternal damnation. She paused and turned around. At her gaze, the man silently recoiled.

FRIDAY, DECEMBER 22ND, 6:42 AM

“So, explain to me why you think that I should grant you three a bonus this year when you currently owe a total of… four thousand, eight hundred and sixty-two dollars in property damage?”

The cool, condescending words were the same, but this time in Plotz’s tall-backed leather chair sat Hello Nurse, dressed in a formal business suit and tie, her yellow hair coiffed back and her hands folded professionally. A sharpened pencil rested behind her pearl-adorned ear. Around her on all sides, afternoon sunlight streamed in from the enormous, panoramic windows, catching CEO Nerz in a fiery beam of power.

She pulled the pencil from her ear and tapped it twice on the damning construction invoice displayed on her desk. A smoking gun.  
“Really,” she dared. “Go ahead. I’d love to see you try.”

Yakko flinched. Okay, curveball, but he could roll with it. Just like they had rehearsed.

“I thought you might bring that up, Nerz,” he began. “Excellent memory as always. Only one of the many reasons why you make such a great… CEO?”

She blinked at him, unimpressed.

“I-I think it’s important to distinguish between the amount of property damage that was actually caused by us,” he continued, gauging her reaction, “and the unfortunate incidents which we were simply,” he winced. “There for.”

She sighed. “Mr. Warner, I don’t see-”

“And! And, and.” He took a deep breath. “I’ll be the first to admit that there was without a doubt some! Some, small, maybe even medium, amount of destruction that was truthfully, though perhaps unavoidably, the result of our own actions, and for that, on behalf of all of us, I would like to extend my humblest, deepest apologies. Let’s put the past in the past, huh? And, the main thing, uh, Nerz, is that really when you look at the amount of income that we’ve generated- may I?” He reached for a sheet of paper. “When you look at the amount of income that we’ve generated for you over the past year, this deduction really is only a necessary side effect of the continued revenue that we produce for you. Look. It’s simply a question of cost-benefit.”  
He began to write frantically.  
“If this is the amount of money that we owe you, four thousand… eight hundred and something. And this is the amount of income that is solely- solely!- a result of our immense popularity, and might I add, financial prosperity, of which we see almost nothing! Then you’ll find that when you do the math… it’s actually you who owes us money.” He beamed smugly and leaned back in his chair, arms crossed behind his head. “Sir. Uh, ma’am.”

She stared at him with an undeniably impressed look on her face. She grabbed the sheet of paper from him and squinted down the line of equations. Her eyes darted back up to the top, and then she went through them again. 

“Well, I hate to say this, Mr. Warner,” she declared, “but this does check out.”

Too easy.

“But then, tell me,” she hummed, sucking on the pink pencil eraser. He watched her cherry red lips shift over it. “Wouldn’t it be of more benefit to me if could see this annual income from you,” she circled the number, “without subtracting any property damage at all?” She scribbled out the handwritten math below. “I would say that this is proof that you are knowledgeably holding us back from generating higher revenue. Mr. Warner, I don’t think that is a sign of a very good worker.”

“Well, the property damage is necessary,” he hit back without pause.

“Oh, really.”

“Yes, and I think the numbers speak for themselves on that, don’t you? This,” he darkened the circle she’d worn into the paper, “Is the result of all of our endeavors and that includes property damage. You can’t pick and choose.” He pointed the end of the pencil in her face. “People want the property damage! You have to give the people what they want, Nerz. The money will follow. Set aside a budget for it.”

She leaned forward on her elbows. “And what do you propose that we cut spending on?”

“I don’t know, maybe your stupid little parties for one thing?”

“Networking is how we make our valuable connections, Mr. Warner. I wouldn’t expect you to understand that. In fact, you still haven’t explained to me why I can’t just find someone who can produce the same profit that you do with zero financial setbacks. Why set aside a budget when I can just… replace you?”

Yakko scoffed at her. “You can’t replace me.” He gestured to the large logo adhered to the desk. “Whose name is that?”

CEO Nerz gestured to her name printed on the stationary atop their sheet of scratched-out algebra. “And whose name is that?” She stood up, arms crossed. “May I remind you that I am your boss? I will do whatever I see fit and I don’t need a teenager to tell me how to run my business.”

Fuck, fuck, dial it back. “Of course, Nerz,” he smiled apologetically. “I wasn’t doubting your competency in any-”

She strode over to the window, placing her finger on a tiny button. The windowshades began to slowly lower in unison.

“I’ll give you one more chance to explain to me why you deserve that bonus,” she said. “But you’re not allowed to use your mouth.”

His eyes followed her back to her desk, where she opened her checkbook and filled out a check, smirking at him. She held it up for him to see. It was made out in his name, to the amount of seven hundred dollars. Then she slowly walked to his chair and inserted the check between his teeth.

“If it falls, it goes in the trash,” she said, and swung her legs over his lap. “If you wrinkle it, it goes in the trash.” 

She tugged him forward by the necktie.

“If you tear it, it goes in the trash.”

She placed her hands on both sides of his face.

“So be gentle with those teeth, killer.”

She brought her lips down on his throat and he tilted his chin up to the whirling ceiling, trying as hard as he could not to bite down on the thin paper. She was gyrating her hips into his, and as she rocked, her skirt shimmied up her bronzed thighs. She had both hands on his shoulders, restricting his arms to the back of the chair. Within moments, he was fully hard and straining against the front of his dress pants. 

Yakko carefully rolled his tongue back so as not to wet the paper and smear the ink, but it was hard to concentrate with Nerz’s fingers on his belt, lightning fast. Her skirt had migrated around her hips, exposing tiny black panties, and as she ground into him, he could already feel the promising warmth beneath. Her hair washed over him in a cloud of dazzling gold, and as she popped open the last button of his pants, she looked up and quirked one eyebrow at him. 

“Don’t spend it all in one place,” she warned, and in one quick motion, she raised herself up, pulled her panties to the side, and sat down on his erect dick.

“Mnn-!” His eyes rolled back in his head as he sank into her hot, wet body. Instantly, he was coming, and as the waves of his orgasm rolled over him, he was only feebly able to wonder whether or not the check was still intact. 

Yakko’s eyes fluttered open to a warm wetness soaking into his fur. He blinked and realized in one horrific strike of clarity that he was in his bed, at home, in the middle of the night. He scrambled up against the bedpost, pulling the sheets tightly around himself, heart racing. Sitting upright, the stickiness had begun to drip down his inner thighs and seep into his pajama pants. 

He silently looked back and forth at Wakko and Dot in utter terror, white-hot shame crashing through his body. They were both asleep in their beds. Completely asleep? He hadn’t made any sound, or God forbid, said anything? He squinted at them in the dark, but they were out cold. He let out a breath he didn’t realize he’d been holding.

He was way too old to be sharing a room with them, but at this point to move elsewhere in the tower would feel like a betrayal of their friendship. Besides, he wanted to be with them overnight, to make sure they were okay. But these… kinds of dreams… had been a challenge for a while now.

Still staring at them carefully, he lowered the bedsheets and shuffled awkwardly to his dresser, trying simultaneously to be as quiet as possible as well as attempting to prevent more jizz from running down his legs. Although he was alone, he felt his face redden in the darkened room, humiliated. He averted his eyes from his silhouette in the mirror. He couldn’t see into the drawer, so he just snatched a new pair of pajamas at random and closed the bedroom door behind himself carefully.

He threw the ruined pajama pants on the bathroom floor and grabbed a towel to scrub himself off, but, judging by the orange glow starting to dance in from the window, it was already almost sunrise, so he might as well just get ready for the day. He turned on the shower.

As the warm water ran over his shoulders, his mind floated back to the dream. Sex for seven hundred? Talk about unnecessary financial setbacks. He would’ve done it for free. He closed his eyes and thought about Hello Nurse lowering herself down onto him. Of course, in real life, TP had taken one look at his math and idiotically accepted it without one further argument, let alone- Oh God! Ew! Why did he have to think of that! Ugh! He finished the shower in revulsion and reached for a towel. What else was he going to scream into.

In any case, the fact remained that he would have to tell Dot and Wakko he needed more privacy. There just wasn’t any alternative. But he had absolutely no idea how to have that conversation, and the thought of broaching the topic made him uncomfortable. They were sure to ask why, and he wouldn’t know what to say.

He looked at his reflection and ran his bare hand over the stubble growing in around his mouth, then covered the area with shaving cream. He picked up his razor and began trimming the black hairs back down against his white fur. They knew that he shaved his face, at least. But as far as he could tell, their understanding of his physical differences in regards to their rather significant age gap only extended further to him being tall and caring about boring things. Knowing how to do their taxes. Willingness to read mail. Ability to drive, albeit poorly and without a license.  
Was there a way that he could discuss this without getting into any detail about the things that he’d prefer not to share? He cringed inwardly at the very idea of talking… about… his… 

…body?! 

Nope! Fuck no!! No, he would have to just live like this forever. He needed a second to recover from that visualization. He stared at his beard hairs in the sink for a moment before straightening up to continue his work.

Someone would have to tell them these things eventually, though. No one had told him anything. He'd just had to figure it out as he went along. 

He rinsed the razor and looked out at the sunrise. Maybe since he was up early, he would be really nice and make waffles for everyone this time. After all, this was a day full of possibility. 

At that thought alone, his heart rate quickened again.

FRIDAY, DECEMBER 22ND, 8:00 PM

Rippling orchestral music could be heard even from the stone steps outside, each railing lined with ribbons of red and gold balloons, which swayed lazily in the mild breeze, rubber softly kissing rubber with each leap in the wind.  
A wooden awning strung with glittering lights and lavish white banners had been set up over the entryway, and partygoers in three piece suits and extravagant gowns dotted the veranda, cocktails in some hands, long, thin cigarettes in others, all narcissistically evaluating the spectacle’s grandeur against their own lofty expectations. Amongst the murmuring guests, Heloise could already begin to make out the important faces of godlike legends who had deigned to bless the lower mortals with their attendance. Clearly, no expense had been spared on their behalf.

Those sacred heads turned down to Heloise as she made her way up the staircase, heavy red skirt gathered above her ankles, each pair of eyes casting her a critical gaze that wordlessly asked, ‘Who are you?’

Me? No one. I just work here. I barely even have a name.

Atop the stonework, the colossal double doors were propped open, casting forth a beam of blinding blue-white light, and within sprawled a sweeping scene of almost hedonistically indulgent decadence. Heloise stepped into the pool of light inside and slowly approached the balcony overlooking the marvelous party below.

In the middle of the room bubbled a large, three-tiered marble fountain, a blue and gold mosaic winding beneath the tossing crystalline water. Guests sat around the fountain’s ledge, clutching their champagne glasses, only one precarious alcohol-induced tumble away from drenching their Prada gowns in the watery depths, but, for many of those present, a replacement would be pocket change.

Coiling around the fountain were a few hundred partygoers, interspersed among tall, silk-laden banquet tables saddled variably with charcuterie boards, chocolate fondue fountains, and hors d’oeuvres. 

The left side of the enormous hall was devoted to a flourishing dance floor, the walls loaded gratuitously from top to bottom with blown glass in the shape of hanging icicles. The right side of the hall housed a gold-plated bar, featuring a simmering burner, atop which sat an enormous bowl of mulled wine, the fresh oranges and cinnamon within bobbing temptingly in the dark red sea and bathing the air in a heavenly scent.

The entirety of the room was lit by thousands, maybe millions, of suspended lights, hovering over the party like stars, but the glitziest light source of all was the towering Christmas tree pushed against the ornate wall, reaching almost to the top of the balcony where Heloise stood. She thought that if she reached out, she might be able to poke at the luminous angel perched at the peak of its highest branch.

A comparatively modest circle of presents lay at the base of the Christmas tree. This must be for the employee Secret Santa, Heloise thought. She lightly touched the small, wrapped gift in her pocket. 

What was the name of the team that had set this all up again? She wanted to know who to talk to about the contrast between what she’d been told was a generous holiday bonus and what had been clearly available to spend on reindeer-shaped ice sculptures. Halfway down the staircase, Heloise spotted the coat check, and she shrugged off her jacket.

Conversation audibly fizzled out around her. At the foot of the stairs, faces turned upwards towards Heloise, and she unabashedly met each stunned gaze- or, tried to, but not one pair of eyes lined up with her own. Oh, right. Well, it was more of a titties out look.

She descended to the first floor, very aware of the unwavering stares of men and women alike as she walked by. Whispers arose amid the swanky jazz arrangement as she leaned down to add her present to the pile. She looked at it and drew in a shaky breath. She clasped her hands together and turned away, then glanced back at it again, heart racing. It was there. It was done. 

She tore herself away from the pile of presents, unsure what she should be doing now. Although she recognized many guests, she knew few, and at any rate was not feeling up to plunging into conversation with a stranger. As if aware of her aimlessness, the smell of spiced cinnamon and citrus led her over to the bar.

As Heloise dipped the engraved metal ladle into the bowl of mulled wine, a familiar voice startled her.  
“Miss Nerz?”  
It was Dr. Scratchnsniff. Relieved to finally have a task, Heloise turned to talk to him, but froze, gripped by discomfort, when she saw the look on his face.  
“May I say zaht you, ah, look very, ah, nice tonight?”  
He giggled in a nervous way, wringing his hands together.

She tried to keep the nauseated look off of her face. Don’t throw up. She turned around and came face to face with a man she had never seen before.

“And who might you be, gorgeous?” He leaned down towards her. “I’d introduce myself,” he laughed and ran a hand through his curly hair, “but I’m sure that won’t be necessary.” 

She couldn’t decide who she’d like to speak to less.

“You ever done donuts in a Lambo?” Asked another pale, ratty stranger behind her. “And would you like to?”

You knew this would happen, she reminded herself, as more and more hecklers lurched towards her out of the crowd like ravenous zombies.

But, as if by divine intervention, an earsplitting crash arose from the far side of the room, and a subsequent wave of screams drowned out the music. Mercifully, she found herself alone once again as the group of men around her dispersed curiously towards the source of the chaos. She brought the nearly full glass of wine up to her lips, the better to calm her nerves with.

“Hello, Nurse.”  
It was Yakko. She had assumed it must be.

He was wearing a cream-colored tuxedo suit with a navy blue bow tie, and looked, overall, as though he’d made an effort. His hair was slicked back between his ears, and a flirtatious smirk adorned his face. She wondered how there had ever been a time when she had not considered him to be handsome. Was anyone else aware that he was handsome? Were they just not saying anything?

“Thank you for rescuing me,” she said, sincerely.  
He cocked his head, ears bouncing sideways. “For what?” He asked. “They just don’t screw chandeliers in like they used to. It’s lazy workmanship.” As he spoke, he ladled himself a glass of the mulled wine. “Love the dress, by the way,” he continued. “But I thought you wanted me to last a long time?”

She spluttered into her drink. He waited politely for her to finish coughing.

“Okay, start over,” she laughed. “Maybe don’t admit that. Or don’t lead with it. And, um?! Are you- are you just going to openly drink alcohol in front of everyone like that?”

“Yes,” he said, batting his eyelashes at her as he clinked his glass against hers. “They’re all too afraid to say anything to me. Not everyone’s got that magic touch like you.” He took a sip and immediately gagged. 

“I’m gonna need to see some I.D., sir,” Heloise barked in a comically deep voice. Still struggling, Yakko went to wipe the wine from his mouth but then stopped at the sight of his immaculate white tuxedo sleeve.

“If I’d known we were going to follow the rules tonight,” he rasped, “I wouldn’t have shown up.”

The song had faded to an end, and in the sudden silence, a shriek rose up from above the throng.

“YOU!” 

They turned to see Thaddeus Plotz pushing through the masses with an absolutely livid expression.

“Goodbye, Nurse,” said Yakko with a cheerful salute, and disappeared into the crowd. Heloise drained the rest of her drink. At the bottom of the glass was an embossed letter W.

Instead of a new live band taking the stage, bright lights flashed from the dancefloor and a bearded man stepped into the DJ booth, breaking the formal dress code only slightly with his choice to wear sunglasses, though they were indoors at night.  
He dove into a questionable dance remix of several popular Christmas songs at once. It was a bold endeavor that was hard to do well, and he certainly demonstrated that. Regardless, a good third of the crowd rushed out onto the floor excitedly.  
Heloise was half-tempted to join, but skulked around at the bar instead and poured herself another drink, preferring to watch for the time being. She was suddenly feeling impatient for the night to move along faster.

Heloise’s eyes skimmed the crowd. There were some very famous and very beautiful people here, and they made everyone else look like roadkill. You may be a Massachusetts ten, but you’re an L.A. four.

But just as she had begun to feel out of place, a sultry female voice beside her drawled, “You look amazing.”

Heloise whipped around and spilled her glass all over a gossamer gown, the flimsy fabric hugging a perfectly slender, petite body, which red streaks of wine now unfortunately dripped down. Even the woman’s flawless blonde hair had caught some of the splatter, and large, angular eyes blinked at her, surprised, from a triangular face, thin lips parted in shock.

“Oh my fucking god,” Heloise cried. “I’m so- I’m so sorry, you’re… Michelle Pfeiffer, aren’t you?” Stupid question! “Let me get you a-”

She reached into her new red purse and pulled out a napkin. Thank God she had one. The one fucking time a real celebrity ever talked to her.

“That’s okay,” Pfeiffer smiled good-naturedly. “Please, don’t worry about it.”

How could she not? Heloise dabbed at the red vines running down Pfeiffer’s skeletal collarbone. “I’m sorry, I’m sorry, really,” she was babbling. At least this would be a funny story someday. 

The damage extended below Pfeiffer’s paper-thin gown, where she was visibly braless. Heloise hesitated, still holding the napkin against her damp chest, struck by uncertainty as to whether offering help would be ruder than not offering it. How was she even in this situation? She looked around the room wildly.

Her gaze stopped at the sight of Yakko, hovering motionless amidst the horde. He was looking back at her with an unreadable expression frozen on his face.

Ding!

Heloise looked up for the source of the noise to see an ornate clock carved into the wall, chiming as it heralded the arrival of 10:00. She’d already been here for two hours? 

“It was… nice to meet you,” Pfeiffer said dryly, and walked away, leaving Heloise with a winestained napkin in her hand, wondering what the hell just happened. She looked back towards where she’d seen Yakko, but he was gone, too.

“Alright, everyone, it’s ten,” someone chirped through the speakers. “If you participated in the Secret Santa, please make your way over to the Christmas tree!”

Heloise looked around the room again, but Yakko was nowhere in sight. 

Why had he left? This was the moment. It was time.

She joined the small group around the tree, each one clearly waiting to get back to the party. About half appeared to be very drunk, and most at least tipsy.

The woman who’d just spoken into the microphone began plucking presents from the skirt of tree and calling forth their recipient. 

“Mr. Plotz?” He waddled forth.

He looked into the bag to find a mug with Batman on it. “I already have one,” he said rudely. Heloise looked around. Yakko still wasn’t back.

“Ralph T. Guard?” The woman announced.

He ripped open the box greedily. It was a bathroom scale. Wow, someone around here was really mean. He seemed delighted, though, happily announcing that his last one had just broken.

Where was Yakko? Had he changed his mind?

“H- Hel- ” Heloise stepped forward to collect her gift.

She hadn’t even thought about the fact that she would be getting a present from someone, too. It was a black bag full of pink gift wrap. Inside were three pairs of socks with cute black cat faces on them, the soles of which were decorated with pink toe beans. Oh. Because of her fake kitten. She smiled cheesily, waving the socks for the indifferent group to see.

It seemed that no one here really knew one another very well, as almost all of the gifts were either an extremely bad guess or rather unimaginative. She wondered if it would be suspicious that she’d hit the nail on the head with Yakko’s.

Where was he? The pile was dwindling. Maybe he didn’t want it.

The rest of the group collected their presents, one by one, in a heart-pounding blur. Heloise’s mind was racing. He didn’t want her gift anymore. He didn’t want her anymore. 

“Yakko Warner?” the woman finally called.

There was a murmur around the group as they realized, to no one’s surprise, that he wasn’t there. 

Heloise struggled to keep a neutral expression on her face. He had left. He had changed his mind. He didn’t want her. 

“Yakko Warner?” She repeated into the microphone.

He was gone.

Chatter begin to rise up from the group as they lost interest, but above their voices rose the twinkling of bells from the dancefloor.

I don’t want a lot for Christmas, there is just one thing I need…

There it was for the millionth time, that twinkly Mariah Carey song blaring over the speakers, jubilantly merry, as if Carey herself were shoving the dagger into Heloise’s ribcage. An excited and somewhat drunken cheer rose up from the crowd.

Apparently having decided that Secret Santa was over anyway, Heloise’s coworkers began to join the wave surging towards the dancefloor. Numbly, she let herself be carried along with them.

She wasn’t sure how convincing her false enjoyment of the music was. It was taking all of the energy she had just to keep a trembling smile on her face. Fuck. She’d been so fucking stupid. How could she have gotten into this?! She would never have done something like this.

This wasn’t her.  
But who even was she anymore?

The worst part, though, was how much it hurt. It hurt like she was the bitch in the trolley problem and she deserved to be sacrificed for the good of those five, decent people. At the same time, though, it hurt like a Swarovski crystal chandelier shattering on the ballroom floor. She knew, morally, that her guilt should outweigh her heartbreak, but it didn’t. 

Why?  
Why did he leave?  
Did she do something wrong? 

Yes, said a voice in her head, waking from a long hibernation. Yes, you did.

Tears stung her eyes. A horrible, hollow pit had begun to form in her chest, and its weight cut off her breathing, her circulation, her consciousness. Cast into this pit the demon you’ve become, the voice demanded. You deserve nothing. If anyone here could see your vile, evil soul, they’d be disgusted.

She closed her eyes and a traitorous tear slipped from one lid. At its escape, others followed, promising a downpour. She pried at the sinful weeds sprouting everywhere within her, but the roots were wrapped around her heart, holding fast. Tugging at them was almost physically painful. Why?!

There was no reason for it to hurt like this.

It had only ever been…

It had been…

“For you, mademoiselle,” he’d said. He pronounced that word more incorrectly than anyone she’d ever heard. She laughed, then choked back a sob, and the tears began flooding her face. She wished she taken the paperclip from him. ‘Twas but a simple token of his adoration. The hollow pit within her widened as she realized the implications of the grief she felt at the loss of that happy memory. Happy? Yes, happy. She hadn’t even realized how happy she had been. 

Her nose was running, and her face was a mess. She needed to get out of here. The upbeat dance track ended and in its place emerged a low, quivering voice, absent of any instrumental accompaniment.

If I should stay,  
I would only be in your way.

So I’ll go, but I know  
That I’ll think of you every step of the way.

Fuck, not this. She brought her hands up to cover her face, turning to leave before anyone could notice, but she found her wrist caught in midair by a white-gloved hand. 

Her breath cut short in her throat.

“Hello, Nur-” Yakko stopped, devastation in his eyes. “Why are you crying?”

He came back?

The hollow pit in her chest healed rapidly, all scars from the wound vanishing without a trace, and in its place shone warm, glorious August sunshine.

“I’m not,” she sniffled, wiping at her cheeks. She found herself unable to keep the smile off of her face. “I’m not.”

He placed a hand around her waist and intertwined their fingers with the other. Slowly, they started to dance.

“I just… well, I thought you left,” she explained.

“No,” he said. “I’m here. Sorry, something came up.”

“You were gone,” she looked at the enormous clock. 10:22. “Twenty-two minutes. You just vanished without saying anything, and I thought we had an unarranged arrangement right around now.”

“Maybe,” he paused. “But I was always gonna come back, though.” He outstretched an arm and she twirled under it, crouching down low as her skirt spun out around her. They both laughed at the awkward pirouette, and she felt all of the residual despair evaporating from her body as if it never held any power over her. He held her close again. "I'm always gonna come back, just wait for me."

“Well, I didn’t know that,” she said.

“Then next time, I’ll tell you,” he promised, and dipped her with one arm. The glimmering lights from the glass icicles shone around them, and everything else faded away.

She felt her hair brushing the floor as she looked into his eyes, so close to her own. She was entirely possessed by a deep and urgent desire to kiss him. It was the only way she could think to communicate the earthquake of emotion churning through her body. 

But instead, she leaned in and whispered, “Why don’t you go open your present now?”

FRIDAY, DECEMBER 22ND, 11:00 PM

The only gift left beneath the tree was wrapped in red-and-green striped paper, and topped with a curly white bow. The handwritten label read, “Y. Warner, From Santa.” He shook the square package. It did not make any noise.  
He looked around and then ripped off the paper, recognizing it almost instantly by the shiny, oversaturated cover. Donkey Kong for the Gameboy.

He turned the plastic case over in his hands, irritated disappointment growing. She really did like to torture him, didn’t she. All this for-

It was oddly heavy. He opened it, and spotted a metallic glint underneath the cartridge. Breathlessly, he removed the game to see a bronze key laying below. Strung along its thin keyring was a miniature note.

“Let’s lock the door this time.”

His head snapped back up to Hello Nurse, but she was no longer on the dancefloor. 

That was okay. He slipped the key into his pocket. He knew where she’d be.

With a brassy click, the formerly locked door to the psychiatry office swung open, and Yakko, drink in hand, stepped into the darkened room, lit only by the glow of the table lamp and the string of cheap festive lights hanging from the wall molding, significantly less impressive than the scene they’d just left, yet at once far more inviting.

Heloise gazed at him from the chaise longue. He didn’t look at all surprised to see her there as he closed the door behind him and smoothly flicked the lock back into place. She rose from the velvet cushions and ambled towards him.  
“That was fast,” she purred. “You only just started the game and you’ve already found the princess’s tower.”

“Pauline isn’t a princess, she's just some lady,” he corrected, then stopped himself when he saw her expression. He cleared his throat and assumed a gallant posture, like a swaggering tycoon at a hunting lodge. 

“Hello, Nurse,” he began again in a suave tone, and adjusted his bow tie. He gently placed his wine glass down on the desk and tugged at the hem of each glove, one at a time. “If you’ll pardon me for one moment, please.”

Then he plunged his face into her cleavage.

Oh- Honestly!

His ears skimmed her chin left and right, and she floundered her arms, unsure what the proper response was to being motorboated on sight.

He straightened up, retrieved the wine glass, and resumed his aristocratic posture at the desk. “As you were saying,” he implored courteously, taking a sip from the wine with both eyes closed, believably aloof if not for his red face and distinctly tented pants.

She cleared her throat. “So, Pauline isn’t a princess?”

“Well, I haven’t played it yet,” he frowned, clearly frustrated with their continued discussion of Donkey Kong. “They could always make her a princess.”

She took a step into his space and plucked the glass from him, replacing it on the desk. “I could always make you a man,” she said.

“Then what are you waiting for?”

She drew her hand to his chest, and as soon as her fingertips made contact with his creamy suit jacket, he tackled her into the wall.

She yelped into Yakko’s mouth, striking suddenly against her own, and as one fang caught against her bottom lip, she felt her insides boil. She arched into him, the weight of his body pushing feverishly against hers and sparking a need within her like a lit fuse.  
He was moving at lightning speed. His hands were running all over her, as if unable to make up his mind about what he wanted to touch first, darting from her breasts, to her hips, to her legs, to her ass, and back again. She captured one in its frenzied tracks. Gotcha.

“Actually, Mr. Warner, why don’t you start by helping me out of this?” She turned and placed his hand on the zipper of her dress, lifting her hair above her head. She could hear his breath hitch behind her.

Fingers caressed her shoulder blades, and carefully, he pulled the zipper down her spine, then tugged at the ends of the tied corset bow, and, effortlessly, the heavy evening gown fell in a pool of red silk around her feet.

She stepped out from the scarlet sea and pushed it to the side with the toe of one of her high-heeled red shoes, all she still wore aside from a thin, lacy red thong, matching nail polish, and diamond earrings.

Yakko seemed to be setting a new record for the longest amount of time he could be silent while awake. His wide eyes roamed, awestruck, over her body, and he opened his mouth several times, but only released wordless breaths. He stood stiffly as though electrocuted in the yellow lamplight, threatening to topple over at any moment. 

She reached out and stroked the side of his shellshocked face, and he leaned into her touch with a whimper.

Finally, he whispered, “You’re- you’re so beautiful.”

She smiled and wrapped an arm around his hips, pressing her body against him again, though this time separated by less fabric. “That was the right thing to say,” she whispered back. He looked delirious. 

Tentatively, he began to kiss her bare shoulders, trailing down to her breast, but he faltered to a stop, breathing hard.

“I can’t wait any longer,” he stammered. “I- I want… I want to…” He bit his lip and blinked at her pleadingly. “Please,” he begged.

She nodded at him. They could skip the foreplay. Four months is a long enough time to preheat the oven.

His hands flew to the buttons of his tuxedo trousers, fumbling to remove them as fast as possible. 

“Wait,” she said. She walked back to the chaise, reached into her purse, and pulled out a thin latex condom. “Do you know what this is?”

He paused and gave it a disdainful look. “Yes,” he replied.

“Okay,” she said. “I can help you put it on.”

“I think that I’d like it better if I didn’t.”

What the- !

“Excuse me, Mr. Warner!” She demanded. “I think that I’d like it better if you didn’t, too, but that’s not really the point, is it?”

He crossed his arms. “You told me I didn’t have to do anything I don’t want to do.” He snuck his nose in the air.

What!

“I can’t believe you just said that,” she laughed, incredulous. “What an incredibly fucked up and manipulative thing to say.”

“Why! How?” He asked, gesturing wildly.

“Because! It’s not the same thing at all! And you should know that it’s generally considered pretty rude to be arguing about this!”

“I’m just stating a preference,” he said defensively, turning his face away from her as though he had any right to be offended.

“Yakko,” she said. “You’re already basically raising two little children. Are you sure that you want more?”

He opened his eyes, then yanked the condom out of her hand. 

He tried to tear it open, but the white fabric slipped unyieldingly against shiny plastic. Exasperated, he pulled the glove off and held it in his teeth, but Heloise’s heart stopped when she saw him about to rip open the wrapper using fingertips that extended into razor-sharp claws.

“Let me do that,” she jumped in and pulled it away. She hadn’t brought a second one.

She held the latex ring in her palm and looked up at him. They both paused, then, with a shaky breath, he unfastened the last button of his pants, and his hard, red cock bobbed up towards her. She had to take a moment to drink in the sight of him still fully dressed in an extravagant three-piece tuxedo and velvet bow tie, yet sporting a proud, exposed erection out in front of the formal regalia.

She knelt before him as she had on Monday morning and rolled the condom on. He inhaled sharply at her touch, then offered a hand to pull her up from the floor.

She tugged on the lapel of his suit coat, and he allowed her to remove it. Beneath, he was wearing a pressed white dress shirt and navy blue suspenders to match the tie. She unhitched these from his belt loops and they fell around his waist, permitting the trousers to slide down from his skinny, protruding hipbones. Heloise loosened the bow tie and placed it respectfully on the desk next to the wine glass, leaving him in just the collared shirt. She hesitated at the unusual sight of him in a shirt but no pants, then worked on the top button, then the second, revealing the thick tufts of black chest hair underneath. 

He actually growled at her. 

“Enough,” he said impatiently, and slammed her back against the wall. Intoxicating arousal spiked through her veins at that dangerous, low, inhuman sound, and as heat rushed through her body, he hoisted one of her legs up around his hips, finding an angle. Dizzily, she scrambled to pull her panties away, but he wouldn’t release her leg from his grasp. Instead, without breaking eye contact, he placed his glove back in between his teeth and sliced through the thin side strap with one claw as though it were butter. She moaned heatedly, feeling wetness begin to soak her inner thighs.

“Fuck me,” she ordered.

And without a moment’s hesitation, he pushed up into her, breaching her body all the way to the base of his cock. Both cried out at once, and she rolled her head back, smacking it accidentally against the wall behind them.

She gasped for a moment, impaled against the wall, adjusting to the firm thickness seated deeply between her legs. As she made eye contact with him, he smirked, braced his bare hand against the wood paneling, hitched her leg up higher with the gloved one, and thrust into her with ten times the feral strength she’d been craving. 

The office jolted roughly in front of her, as if she were observing it from atop a wooden rollercoaster, as she struggled to hang on to the back of his halfway unbuttoned white shirt. I work here, she thought over his shoulder, the scene in front of her shaking violently up and down. This is the place where I work. His forehead was pressed against the wall, and she could hear him panting into her ear with each violent jerk of his hips.

The slanted head of his dick was hitting a sweet spot inside of her, and she felt invigorating gratification begin to build up, white-hot pleasure finally scratching that desperate itch. Her knee shook, and her free leg gave out beneath her, inertia the only force still holding her against the wall as he fucked her relentlessly. A cracking noise rang out over their own vulgar sounds, and she looked to see that a fragment of wood had ripped off of the wall in his claws, which he threw aside carelessly. Without that hand supporting them, though, she found herself sliding to the floor.

Her face was smothered in the red dress piled on the ground. She struggled to get up, but before she could even raise herself onto her knees, Yakko pounced on her from behind, and she fell back to the floor forcefully. His gloved hand pinned her down by the shoulder blade, and the black one gripped the polished wood beside her face. Her eyes widened as she saw his claws once again sink into the planks with ease, and she gave a hysterical shout as he pushed his cock back into her from above. 

With a satisfied moan, he moved to lay on top of her, holding her down by the weight of his body, and he removed the hand from her shoulder blades to pull her head back by the hair instead. She heard him shamelessly breathe in the scent of the golden strands, before moving his face down to bite her fiercely on the back of the neck, harboring no trace of the delicacy he’d always previously taken care to use whenever he brought his fangs to her skin. At the sharp, piercing pain, she began to cry out, but her eyes rolled back as he thrust into her brutally, and as he once again brushed that sweet spot, she was suddenly met with the electric, fulfilling wave of her orgasm.

Seeing stars from her place on the ground, she wondered if he realized what was happening, if he knew why her muscles were contracting spasmodically around him. He made a broken noise that confirmed he must.

As her vision began to clear, she found her mind blissfully empty and placated. Then Yakko yanked her head back again and she snapped to attention. Alright, mister. 

She got up on her hands and knees, throwing him off with some difficulty, and the wood in his hand once again tore in splintering shards from its foundation. Heloise spun around and shoved Yakko to the ground this time by his undone shirt, pushing him down onto his back. He caught himself on his elbows, a clouded, glazed-over haze of lust shrouding both eyes. His long legs were bent, and between them his red cock stood upright. He looked incredible.

She crawled over to him and sat up on her thighs, hovering over his hips. A fiery smile lit up his face, tongue between his teeth. She watched his mouth drop open as she sat down onto him, and she allowed him one moment to recuperate before she began riding him masterfully, slowly at first, and rolling into a thundering momentum, her body rocking into his with a rhythmic wet slap.

“Fuck!” He screamed, eyes closed, his gelled-back hair shaking out over his forehead. Despite the situation, she blushed. She couldn’t recall ever having heard him yell out that word like that, or even barely at all, and it felt somehow scandalous. What else could she get him to say?

His hands were reaching up for her breasts as they swayed above his face. She leaned forward to make it easier, but gasped as the claws of black fingers made contact with her skin. She pinned that hand down above his head.

He was tilting his chin up to the ceiling, writhing against the floor as she bounced up and down on his dick, mounted astride his hips. 

“Do you think you make me cum again?” She murmured, hoping to elicit some dirty talk, but instead, all she got in return was another growl. 

She scrambled off of him as he suddenly stood up, then in one swift movement he turned her around and bent her over the front of the desk, ramming his cock back into her harder than before, his gloved hand tugging at her hair once again. As they collided with the desktop, papers and nameplates fell to the floor in a slow-motion shower of ruin. She reached out to try to stop the spinning hurricane of paperwork, but he secured both of her wrists behind her back with his tail, then lay on top of her again, holding her beneath him.

She tried to move her hands and found them bound fast. He tightened his grip on them harder at her attempt. Oh fuck, yes. Purely out of her arousal at this unexpected confinement, she felt a second orgasm budding within her.

The desk was banging loudly on the floor, and its wooden legs closest to them were lifting on and off of the ground, threatening the whole thing to tip over at any moment, them along with it. She watched drawers fall out, their contents spilling over the floor. The wine glass tumbled over with a crash and the rest of its contents splashed indiscriminately over papers, furniture, and two tangled bodies. The gold-painted, abstract clay bust of Sigmund Freud wobbled perilously, traveling closer to the edge of the desktop. 

Fall. Fall. 

It tipped over and shattered on the ground.

She laughed triumphantly, then looked quickly at Yakko, but he was also grinning victoriously at the destructed sculpture. 

She was about to comment on how much she hated Freud anyway, but then his hips began to stutter, and he pushed both of them flat against the desk. With each thrust, he cried out ecstatically, and, reaching out, he raked five long streaks of claw marks across the polished surface. His eyelids fluttered.

Heloise was ready for his climax, but instead she felt a thick, growing pressure around her labia. It was bigger than anything she’d ever taken before, even larger, she’d guess, than the size of her fist, and she could barely endure it. 

“AHHH!” She wailed, tears coming to her eyes. The solid mass was moving farther up into her, stretching her out uncomfortably far. “What- what’s happening?!”

Yakko had released his grip on her wrists, and when she turned her head, she saw alarmed terror in his eyes. “I- I don’t know!!” He stuttered. “This never happened before!” He tried to pull out of her, but both gasped at the resulting pain. It was too big to slide out. “I’m… I’m stuck?!” 

He raised his hands and straightened up behind her, hyperventilating, as she stayed bent uncomfortably over the desk. 

She forced herself to relax as much as possible, hoping her muscles would loosen while she waited for this to end, but as the minutes passed and nothing changed, Yakko began to visibly freak out. His breathing grew erratic, and he clutched at his chest with both shaking hands. He was looking around the room frantically.

“Hey, hey,” she said, craning her neck to get a better view of him from her position against the ruined desktop. She took a deep breath, using all of her energy to hide visible signs of pain. “It’s okay. I’m right here. It’ll be okay. This won’t last forever.”

“But what if- what if- it- does?” He choked. He was doing worse than she had thought. She needed to focus on preventing him from having a panic attack, which may prove to be a challenge while facedown on a desk.

“Let’s take some deep breaths,” she coaxed. “Inhale while I count to eight, okay?” He obeyed her. “Now hold it, then exhale while I count again. Good.” She smiled. “You know, I really can’t see anything from here. Would you mind describing the room to me?”

He looked around again. “But you work here every- Oh, no.” 

That didn’t sound promising.

With trembling fingers, he probed at the tender place where they were secured together. What was he looking at? She felt around, and her fingertips landed on ripped shreds of latex. She pulled one out from its trapped position between his engorged cock and her aching walls, and she held it up to her face. As she removed it, a trail of sticky jizz began leaking down her legs. The condom must’ve broken when he’d expanded. These were designed for the ordinary penises of human men. So was her vagina, she thought ruefully to herself, trying not to think about her discomfort.

“I- I- I’m not- I’m not ready- to be- a father- I’m-”

Oh, fuck.

“Yakko, it’s okay, don’t worry. Please. You’re not going to be a father.”

He stared at her, shoulders shuddering. She wished she could hug him.

“I’m on the pill. The birth control pill. I won’t get pregnant. Besides, I really don’t think that could work… biologically.”

Somehow, this seemed to calm him down a lot. He squinted at the drawn window shades, lost in thought.

“Okay… so why did you make me wear it, then?” He demanded.

“Oh, my fucking god!” She laughed. “Don’t you dare start that again. Making you wear a condom is not a hate crime. I told you that gentlemen don’t argue about this.”

He was smiling again at her banter. Stay on this topic.

“It’s just a very douchey thing to do,” she explained. “If you tried that with any other woman, or man, even,” he raised his eyebrows at her, “they’d probably just walk away. No glove, no love.”

He looked at his bare hand and trailed one finger down the curve of her back. His claws had retracted. 

“I can touch you,” he said, emotion in his voice. Her eyelashes fluttered against the desk as he ran his fingers gently over her naked body.

His touch, at first, was tender and affectionate, dipping into the curves of her shoulder blades and skimming along the softness of her toned waist, but as he explored, the light caress turned into something else. He squeezed at her thighs hungrily, then he pushed her asscheeks apart and watched as they jiggled above his dick, still planted inside her. She listened to his interested moan, and felt a prickling sensation against her skin as the claws began to re-emerge. He must’ve realized he was running out of time, too, because he abruptly smacked her ass, hard enough to make her shout.

“Oh, Yakko!” She cried admonishingly, and at the sound of his name she watched a wicked grin flitter across his face. He raised the hand again.

“Behave,” she threatened. He struck her again, biting his lip, thrilled, at the resulting bounce. She was sure that she’d be covered in marks.

“And what do you think you’re gonna do about it, Nurse?” His voice was lilting and slow. She inhaled sharply.

He leaned back down over her so that their faces were level. “You’re gonna make me behave?” He sang out the last word teasingly. The firm mass within her convulsed, and another small river of cum began to run down around her thighs. He pulled the rest of the torn condom out and hummed, satisfied, at the uncovered contact.

“What are you gonna do, chase me around?” He ghosted his fangs over the back of her neck as if to give her another bite. Her pulse quickened and she flexed against his swollen knot, aroused.

“Oh, Nurse, lock me up, I’ve been so bad,” he crooned, and tugged her head back by the hair again. “I think I’ve got you locked up this time, don’t you?”

She ground her hips against the desk, the promise of a second orgasm returning if only she could just get some clitoral stimulation. 

“Oh, I’m sorry, is this turning you on?” He watched her search for friction. “How embarrassing for you.”

“Fuck! I get it! God fucking damn it, just touch me already!” She cried. She struggled against the desk to move her fingers towards her clit, but he restrained her by the wrist again with his tail. 

“Ah, ah, ah,” he scolded. “Behave.” 

He slid his gloved hand down from her hair, snaking its way below the underside of her hips. His thumb brushed against her clit and she gasped at the contact. He raised an eyebrow at her, then gave her an experimental stroke with two fingers. She arched her back involuntarily, tugging them both forward into the desk. Once again, the knot within her throbbed and a trickle of jizz seeped out against the site where they were tied together.

As she’d already established, Yakko was a fast learner. He began to stroke her in the same gentle motion, steady and generous, and as he did, he placed kisses on her captive throat, her shoulders, and down her back. It was impossible to tell whether the wetness that soaked their legs was a product of her own satisfaction or the release of another stream of sticky, hot cum.

She was already so close, rocking herself against his fingers. He rubbed her faster in response to her urgency, and when she met his gaze, both cried out at once. Her second orgasm buzzed through her body stronger than the first, and at the same time, his cock within her jolted, and she felt an outpouring of heat surging around them. In moments, a truly obscene amount of cum flowed forth from her body as he finally pulled out of her, free. 

She straightened up, thankful for her liberation from the desk, and gasped at the heart-stopping state of the room.

The righthand wall had been torn into, and the splintered wood plank missing from it was lying in a small pile of sawdust on the chaise longue. A spot on the floor had been similarly dismantled, and both surfaces were defaced with scratches. Garments of their elegant, white-collar formal wear were strewn everywhere. Surrounding the desk, papers, files, and drawers were littered around their feet, and the bust of Freud lay in smithereens by the door, along with the wine glass shards and ripped strips of latex. Somewhere along the way, she’d lost her shoes, and Yakko had lost the buttons from his shirt. All of the above were scattered among the ruins. The surface of the desk suffered the worst of the tearing, where five deep trenches had been carved into it. Tacky dried puddles of spiced red wine covered the floor, the furniture, nearly all of the papers, and their own bodies, which were both, and there was really no getting around this fact, absolutely drenched in Yakko’s semen.

Holy hell.

Yakko looked at her, then back at the demolished psychiatric office, then back at her again. She walked naked over to the chaise longue and collapsed next to the severed wooden plank. He sat down in the miraculously undamaged armchair across from her, as if he were her therapist. 

“Well,” She sighed finally. “We’re just going to have to say that we got robbed.”

“That’s what happens when you go around giving out keys,” he said.

They sat in silence again.

“We have to make it look convincing, though,” she added. He folded his hands together, as though listening to her describe a particularly interesting dream.

“So, you’re saying that we need to smash it up even more,” he concluded.

“It should look like someone broke in. Maybe we… shatter one of the windows. Ugh.” She tugged at her disheveled hair uneasily.

“Don’t worry,” he said. “They let me commit almost five thousand dollars worth of property damage per year.”

She had no idea what he was talking about.

“I guess we should take some things, too,” she said. “I can always bring the paperwork home and redo it. Is there anything in here that you want?”

“You, Nurse.”

Though covered as she was in his drying sweat and jizz, she felt herself blush like a Victorian debutante. 

“I’m serious,” he said. “I thought you wanted to smash this place up some more.”

“Oh!” She paused, lightheaded. “At least now we know about the… ”

What was it? 

He drew in a breath. “Yeah,” he said, then laughed. “For a second I really thought we’d be together like that forever.”


	9. Today

From: Heloise Nerz (h.nerz3713@wb.medical.com)  
January 12th, 2020, 11:36 AM [This message was sent over 1 year ago. Reply?]

Yakko,

How can I even begin to say this to you?

I’m sure by the time you read this, you’ll have noticed my absence. I’ve left, and I don’t know if I’ll ever be coming back. I’m halfway across the world from you now. I’m sorry that I couldn’t tell you this in person. But please, read my final words to you and then delete this email.

I know that you’re about to come into a lot of money. Please, please, even if someone tells you where I am, never spend any of this on a plane ticket to find me. Don’t go looking for me. If you try to reply to this, it’ll probably bounce back. I’m not going to be around here much longer.

Even if I had stayed, we could never be together. It has to be over. It has to be.

I need you to know that my leaving is not your fault. None of it ever was. I don’t know if you’re going to be angrier with me for walking out of your life or ever having been part of it, but I deserve all of it. Please, resent me and move on. Live your life without me and be happy. I can’t stand to think of you spending a single minute of your time missing me, because if it hurts even one fraction as much as the pain I feel telling you goodbye, forever, I could never forgive myself.

So my last instructions are this:

Forget everything that ever happened between us, but remember me. 

As terrible as it is, I can’t go on without a place in your memory.

Always,

Hello Nurse

Heloise Nerz, RN  
Warner Brothers Studios Internal Psychiatric Department  
(She/Her/Hers)  
Burbank, CA  
(213)-555-7894

TODAY

WE HEART OUR BRAVE NURSES!

The cards littered Heloise’s bedside table. They looked at her from each surface of the room, echoing the same few words. ‘BRAVE’, ‘THANK YOU’, ‘UNPRECEDENTED TIMES’. As she shut the door behind her, the paper danced in the rush of night air, and the chorus of cicadas silenced.

She sank down into her chair, exhausted, every bone in her body aching. Each day was more draining than the last. She was sure to sleep like a log tonight until it was time to pry herself out of bed again early tomorrow. She’d given up on telling herself that this would all be over soon and that the worst of it had passed, because there was just no way to know. Every day people told her that she was brave, but the word had lost its meaning in overuse. 

She’d been falling into a slump of living the same day every day, growing numb to the devastating scenes of sickness and fear, tired of being the punching bag for scared, misinformed people who latched onto mob mentality as a means to escape their powerlessness. Her only work experience was in psychiatry, but as with anyone who had biomedical knowledge, she’d become a valuable, willing fighter for the vaccination effort. And while she took pride in her work to fight back against the pandemic, it seemed that no one thought twice about how it was affecting her, as well. And not just physically, although she’d already contracted COVID twice from her patients over the past year before she was able to get the vaccine herself, but mentally as well. She worked thirteen hour shifts every day including weekends, and couldn’t even remember the last time she’d had a non-work-related conversation with anyone. How long had it been since she’d even smiled? It was like a dark, heavy cloud of numbness had been growing around her, sucking any semblance of happiness from her life. The new normal, they said.

But it seemed somehow selfish for her to pity herself when she saw so much suffering every day. She was fortunate to be vaccinated, fortunate to be working, fortunate to be healthy. Tonight, she’d make herself some tea and listen to a sleep podcast before bed.

She pulled off her dirt-caked scrubs and sneakers, and began looking in her closet for her softest pajama shirt. A loud buzzing sound cut through her thoughts.

It was her phone alarm. 'TAX STUFF!' read the notification she’d set for herself. 

Dread crawled through her. It was already hard enough to battle the endless mire of tangled legalities involved in international taxes, but this was another situation. No matter how many times she called asking for that W-2 to be sent over, she was given the runaround or sent to voicemail. It was getting to the end of tax season, and she was starting to have half-formed, nonsensical visions of the IRS showing up to charge her with tax evasion play out in her overworked, overtired mind. 

Didn’t she care that Heloise could get in trouble for this? 

Probably not. 

A cold chill ran over Heloise’s skin at the idea that this hassle could be intentional, as if she could feel the malicious fingers of hate reaching out from overseas, never finished with their punishment. 

On that breathless night, the first they’d ever spent in one another’s arms, Yakko had told her on the twinkling dancefloor that he was always going to come back. He’d asked her to wait for him. 

And so she’d waited, 

and waited,

and waited.

Slowly, it had become more of a burden than a commitment born of steadfast devotion. Her faith in him was fading as time rippled on, like ocean waves eating away at unrealistic promises drawn in the sand.

The closest she ever came to giving up, she’d actually interviewed for a position at an Ivy League research hospital on the East Coast and received an offer, but she’d turned it down. She couldn’t leave. He had asked her to wait.

And after an eternity, on one beautiful morning that dawned just as she was on the brink of accepting defeat, she got the news that he had been right all along. Blossoms of joy bloomed again into her once gray and lonely world, like the first warm spring breeze after a long, hard winter, and she counted down the days fanatically, unsure how she could even begin to conceal her emotion when she finally saw his face again.

Most nights she could barely even sleep, unable to quiet the excitement surging through her body and mind. When she did, her dreams were never graphic, never too lurid. But they were there. A sharp fang delicately brushing against her tongue. Thick black fur beneath her fingertips. The prickle of claws dancing across her skin. 

But she’d fallen from her lofty spot drifting amongst the clouds. Or, rather, she had been pushed.

She’d been summoned to the CEO’s office, but it wasn’t until Norita asked her to shut the door that apprehension surfaced in her chest. The ominous feeling only grew as she lowered the shades of the brilliant floor-to-ceiling window and coolly offered Heloise a tumbler of scotch. 

Never, ever, was this a good sign. One’s boss holding a private meeting is bad enough, but the offering of a surreptitious drink behind closed doors is another level of intimidation altogether. It implies that the ensuing conversation will not only be difficult but also will not be on record, and that drinking alcohol on the clock is about to pale in comparison to the issue at hand. 

Heloise nodded her head slowly and sat in the chair pulled forward for her. I knew it, she thought. She’s a complete psychopath. Heloise accepted the short, round glass of what was obviously very expensive scotch, but did not deign to taste it, distrustful.

Norita crossed her arms and watched her, leaning against the window, until she brought it to her lips and sipped from the fiery golden pool within. But rather than explaining what she’d requested her presence for, she merely raised an eyebrow. The silence was beginning to break Heloise. Everything about the situation felt wrong, but, wracking her brains through the last week, month, even year, she could not pinpoint any particular incident that might evoke this bullying.

“So, Ms. Norita,” Heloise began uncertainly, “What may I do for you today?”

Norita smiled and sat down at her desk. She pulled an Excel spreadsheet up on her iPad and pushed it towards Heloise, who had no idea what this was supposed to explain, let alone what kind of chart she was even looking at. The only noise came from the buzzing of the fluorescent lights high above and a vacuum somewhere down the hall. 

Heloise realized that she was the only one drinking the scotch. Norita had a green smoothie on her desk. She wildly wondered if she were being poisoned as she stared at the nonsensical spreadsheet, fearful of the prospect of asking for further clarification, let alone admitting to this panther of a human being that she didn’t understand, but thankfully, Norita began to speak first. 

“As we move into this new year,” Norita began in a piercing voice, “I’m sure you know that rebranding our image is absolutely imperative. To get to this point, we want to promote a progressive message,” she clasped both hands flat together, “about the way women are treated in the workplace. It would not be prudent to broadcast the idea in any form that we tolerate sexual harassment, or remind the public of any such past incidents.”

What was she even talking about? The way women are treated in the workplace? Had she been treating any women... badly?

Slowly, the pieces began to fit together. Heloise herself was the woman Norita was talking about. It was true that she had once very openly experienced sexual harassment at work, but that hadn’t been for a long time, not since- 

“We believe it’s best for our,” she paused, “contemporary image, if you are no longer associated with us.”

Her head spun. What?!

Before she could stop herself, she was on her feet, furious.

“Wow,” she hissed. “So, you’re firing me as a harassment cover-up? You sure are an inspiration to women everywhere, girlboss.” She spat the last word out.

Norita sighed and lounged back in her chair. “So are you, Nerz, which is why this is such a shame. I really am very sorry.”

“Cut the bullshit, Norita,” Heloise placed both palms on the table and leaned into her space. “You’re doing me a favor. I’m going to retire with the money I make from this lawsuit.” She kicked at the chair behind her with a little too much force and it fell backwards onto its side. “You’ll never work again once I come forward to the press about this. In fact, this is going on Twitter as soon as I walk out of your office.”

Norita was squinting at Heloise with a terrifyingly unfazed expression.

“I understand your anger, Nerz, and you’re right, it isn’t fair to you.”

“You’re goddamn fucking right it isn’t fair. The audacity to do this- and to say it’s to prevent sexual harassment- when I’m the victim?!”

Norita leaned forward. “Are you?”

An icy fist grabbed Heloise by the chest, stealing her breath. 

  
“I’m sure the press will love to hear all about this, Nerz.” She reached up and removed her purple-framed glasses, and her brown, catlike eyes shone dangerously, reminding Heloise of someone that she had known long ago. “After all, it’s not like you did anything wrong.”

Heloise couldn’t meet her excruciating gaze. 

Norita gave her a contemptuous glare of utter revulsion. “I think it would be best if you take your shit and get the fuck out of my sight now.” She glanced down at her Apple watch. “I only cut out ten minutes for this.”

On shaky legs, Heloise scrambled to the door. 

“One more thing,” Norita called. Heloise turned around to see her already typing away again at her computer. “I’m going to tell everyone that you quit. I suggest you do the same. For our image, not yours.” She wasn’t looking at her. “I don’t think I need to tell you why you should obey me.”

Cardboard box in both arms, Heloise couldn’t stop herself from turning to take one last look back at the lot. It was silent and peaceful on this bright, sunny day, as it had been for so long. The sky was blue and clear as if to mock her, or perhaps reminding her with the same disgusted loathing that she had no place there.

High above the rooftops, sunlight bounced from the metal siding of the watertower and blinded her. She squeezed her eyes shut, tears finally beginning to gather as her numbness waned and reality came crashing down, and she turned to leave for the last time.

She’d only been into the tower once. It was a hot summer twilight, and the stars had magically aligned for two to spend a night with none but one another. Under the inky black cover of the setting sun, he’d tugged her up the ladder, come on come on come on, both giddy and laughing, high from the rush of hurrying to avoid being seen by any unsuspecting soul who, in a blink, might choose to emerge from the buildings far below. When he pulled her onto the platform and swept her up into his arms, one of her shoes slipped from her toes, a white blur toppling endlessly through the darkness onto the pavement below. But when she tried to insist on retrieving it from the shadowy sea, he had silenced her with a kiss and carried her through the doorway like a blushing bride on her wedding night.

LAST NIGHT

Forget everything that ever happened between us, but remember me.

As terrible as it is, I can’t go on without a place in your memory.

Despite having read the email enough times to have it memorized, Yakko stared at each word yet again, trying to imagine her typing each letter. He’d already disobeyed almost all of her instructions a hundred times over. 

First, he’d immediately tried to reply to the email, and was met with a failure notification. 

Secondly, he’d searched for her on Instagram, Twitter, and Facebook with every imaginable spelling of her name, and scrolled through Dr. Scratchnsniff’s list of followers, all 36 of them. Then he had the brilliant idea to search through everyone’s connections on LinkedIn, but found nothing. He spent about three days just scouring the internet for any account she might’ve forgotten to delete, and he Googled her name about four times daily. He looked through the list of staff in each department on the company website, but any mention of her was completely gone.

Then he’d tried asking about her, but whenever he brought her up, fishing for information, each person he spoke to was either completely clueless or indifferent. Upsettingly, it seemed as though he was the only one who could even accurately remember what she had looked like. He learned quickly to act unbothered by her deafening absence.

There was a vast chasm in this new world, and he balanced around its outskirts, performing an endless production of obliviousness to its yawning abyss. 

But there was one who knew him too well to believe this charade. In what was clearly a test of the extent to which he’d keep up appearances, Dot dragged him along on the most agonizingly uncomfortable double date imaginable. The ‘get over her’ in ‘it will be fun’ was silent, and, it turned out, so was the fun. Unfortunately, both were equally stubborn, and it took one more grueling rendezvous before both admitted to one another that they’d have rather spent the last three hours of their lives lying around sending one another memes. After that, she’d left him to spiral privately into his own yearning nostalgia.

The problem was that no one could be Hello Nurse. There was no one like her, anywhere in the world. She was the only one.

After what seemed like the thousandth read-through, he’d tried calling the number listed at the bottom of her email, but it redirected to the psychiatry office. Dr. Scratchnsniff had answered it, and Yakko hung up on him without saying anything.

When he finally heard through the grapevine that she’d joined Doctors Without Borders, he’d developed a habit of checking the website and Facebook page each morning, reading about the work that each medical team was doing in which parts of the world, looking for any picture or mention of her, trying to judge which group she most likely would want to work with. But they had an operation in over 70 different countries, and even if he did know where she was stationed, he had no idea what city she’d even be in. He checked flight fares every so often, ready to drop the money as soon as he knew more. But as the weeks turned into months, he began to realize that he would never know more.

Although time had alleviated the amount of space she occupied in his day to day consciousness, the memory of her still hurt immensely when it resurfaced, and some nights, like tonight, the tears threatened to return. He stared out of the open bedroom window into the dawning spring sky, hugging the phone to his chest, then placed it on the pillow next to him in the spot she had once occupied, with the email still open and glowing in the darkness. 

He’d disobeyed her request to delete the email. How could he? It was all he had left of her. ‘Everything that happened between us', she’d written. That was the only confirmation he still had that it wasn’t a dream. 

He’d disobeyed her request to forget. That was simply an impossibility.

But he had given her his unshakable forgiveness with everything he had. There was nothing close to resentment in his heart, and he was never angry with her for leaving. If only he could reach back through the past to tell her that. 

The moon peeked out over the palm trees, bathing the room in a brilliant blue light. Come home, come home, come home, come home.

TODAY

Heloise’s phone buzzed again, interrupting her podcast just as she floated towards the brink of sleep, and she rolled over in her burrito of blankets to look at it. 

TAX STUFF!

She rubbed at her eyes, frustrated. She really needed to get this done, no matter how much it sucked, and who knew when she’d have time again. She looked at her world clock. It was only noon in California. God damn it, now she had no excuses.

She blearily sat up in bed and searched through her contacts. Her thumb hovered over the number she’d tried the past five or six times to no avail, and she decided to instead continue her efforts to enlist a third party messenger.

It took Dr. Scratchnsniff a strangely long time to pick up, but then again, he could barely use his phone the last time she had seen him. He shared the habit with many elderly men of prodding at his screen far too forcefully.

“Yes, hallo, who is zis?”

Of course he hadn’t saved her number.

“Hi, doctor, it’s me, Heloise again, how are you? I’m just calling to remind you that I still need my W-2. It’s just for the two weeks in January, you know? I’m sure it wouldn’t be that hard to take care of if she just makes the time to do it.” She tried not to sound bitter. “I can’t ever seem to reach her. Would you please inform her that I called again asking for her to email that over?”

“Oh, yes of course, Miss Nerz –ahh!- I am sorry, I vas- hey!- in a session. I am not sure vether she has sent ze tax forms yet- hey- stop- she has been very busy as alvays- vaht are you doing- ow- get-”

There came a commotion on the other end that sounded a lot like the phone falling on the floor and distant shouting. A dawning suspicion was growing in Heloise’s chest. Her heart began to race.

“Hello, Nurse?” 

Hearing Yakko’s voice felt like nothing she could’ve anticipated. Involuntarily, tears came to her eyes.

“Hello, you,” she said, her voice breaking.

A loud thunk, then shuffling and shouts again. After a few seconds, Dr. Scratchnsniff seemed to have regained control of the situation.  
“Ah, I am so sorry, Miss Nerz. I am sure I do not need to explain to you ze level of difficulty I am dealing vith here. I vill email Ms. Norita again and ask, but I am not sure she vill…”

Heloise wasn’t listening. She lay on her bed with the phone next to her ear, butterflies coursing through her chest and her cheeks wet with happy tears. 

It was dark and cool out, but tonight, she felt the heavenly August sunshine on her skin once more.


	10. [Diagrams/Appendix]

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hi guys! Sorry if this made you think I was going to drop an extra surprise chapter. I had the idea to create a few informative diagrams here pertaining to the contents of Chapter 8, just in case my wording was a little vague. Liberties taken as they have been throughout. Please let me know if this is too confusing for you.

_Fig. 1_


End file.
